Manchester Day of Action (MDoA) is our flagship volunteer programme which includes our global alumni audience in the University’s social responsibility mission. We invite alumni, wherever they are, to identify a local project which needs volunteer support. We review each project and then convene a team of alumni to give a ‘Day of Action’ to support it.  It is a fantastic way for alumni to gather behind a common purpose and at the same time, directly contribute to the University’s world-leading social impact.

There have been twelve projects this year from the Netherlands to Uganda, Toronto to Shanghai. Most of the projects have been delivered and so far we have counted 330 alumni taking part. Volunteer actions have included beach clean-ups, tree planting, helping orphanages and a community running event. One alumna in Mexico City created an Instagram live to teach families about ‘food art’, to make cooking with small children fun and nutritious. Alumni who tuned in were asked to support food poverty by, for example, making donations to local food banks.

All projects have been selected with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in mind. It has brought huge numbers of alumni together physically and online. Our alumni community has helped to create a cleaner environment, supported people in need, promoted sustainable local economies and celebrated better health and wellbeing. Working together, alumni have made a positive difference to the places where they live.

The University’s International Centres have worked closely with local alumni groups. For example, the Middle East Centre helped to coordinate alumni visiting an orphanage for children with special educational needs in Cairo. The Southeast Asia Centre hosted a celebratory event in Singapore which raised funds for a government initiative to support low-income families. The China Centre organised a huge community run, a ‘Purple Wave’ of more than 500 people, through the streets of Shanghai. Our East Asia Centre in Hong Kong ran a virtual workshop which explored the SDGs.

We look forward to seeing what the worldwide alumni community does in 2023.

• Discover more about past projects