Attention: You are using an outdated browser, device or you do not have the latest version of JavaScript downloaded and so this website may not work as expected. Please download the latest software or switch device to avoid further issues.
.svg){kind=logo}
| 17 Dec 2025 | |
| Fundraising |
Hymers College, an independent day school in Hull, UK, ran its first-ever Giving Day in 2025, raising an impressive 85,000 for its Bursary Fund and welcoming 55 new donors.
The campaign surpassed its original £50,000 target by more than 70%, securing 89 online donations and significantly raising awareness of the school’s bursary programme among alumni, parents and friends of the school.
When planning their inaugural Giving Day, Hymers College were still early in their development journey. Just a few years earlier, the school faced several challenges:
❌ No development office (pre-2021)
📄 Data scattered across Excel spreadsheets and paper files
💤 Limited historic donor engagement
To move things forward, the school appointed Emily Pennack as Head of Development, with a remit to establish a sustainable fundraising programme from the ground up.
Working closely with ToucanTech, Emily transformed the school’s fragmented starting point into a robust digital foundation that could support long-term fundraising success.
🔐 Centralised historic and legacy records into one secure database
🔎 Made supporter data searchable, reportable and easy to segment
🌐 Built an online alumni community with 1,500+ registered members
🧩 Tracked interactions and engagement to identify likely donors ahead of Giving Day
For their debut campaign, Hymers designed a dedicated Giving Day hub within ToucanTech that made it easy for supporters to understand the cause, see progress, and take action.
The page brought together:
🎯 Bold hero banner with a clear call to support bursaries
🎥 Embedded thank-you video bringing pupil voices to the forefront
💰 Live donation totals updating in real time
🏆 Challenge tiles encouraging supporters to unlock extra funding
🤝 Matched-funding prompt highlighting generous donor support
💬 Donor messages celebrating community generosity
📲 Share buttons to spread the word on Facebook and Instagram
📊 Giving Day stats showing total donors and total raised at a glance
The Giving Day wasn’t just a 36-hour push – it was the culmination of a carefully planned communications journey. All emails were sent via ToucanTech, using segmented audiences to keep messages relevant.
📣 Build-up emails
🔹 “Three weeks to go” teaser
🔹 “Two weeks to go” bursary story
🔹 “One week to go” reminder
🔹 “24 hours to go” countdown
🚀 Live campaign updates
🔹 Launch-day call to give
🔹 Mid-campaign update featuring refreshed totals
🔹 Day 2 “last chance” reminder
🙏 Post-campaign
🔹 Final thank-you celebrating the community’s impact
Mid-campaign emails combined live totals with prominent call-to-action buttons, prompting supporters who hadn’t yet given to donate or share the campaign.
Behind the scenes, ToucanTech ensured the donor experience was seamless, while giving the Hymers team clear, real-time insight throughout the campaign.
💳 Stripe and GoCardless handled secure online payments
📩 Automatic thank-you emails triggered instantly
🎁 Gift Aid captured and recorded automatically
📈 Real-time dashboards tracked totals, donor numbers and first-time gifts
For a lean team, this meant less time spent on manual administration and more time focused on stewardship and storytelling.
Hymers College’s first Giving Day delivered a powerful set of outcomes:
💷 £85,000 raised (including Gift Aid), against a £50,000 target
👥 89 online donations
🌟 55 first-time donors, expanding the future pipeline
📣 Increased awareness of the Bursary Fund and its impact across the wider community
Hymers’ campaign shows that with the right foundations in place, even a relatively new development function can deliver a high-impact, high-participation Giving Day.
Interested in running your own Giving Day? Get in touch to see how ToucanTech can help.
