Giving Tuesday 2024
Update: Thanks to your support, we have met our matched giving goal! Below, our CEO sums up the enormous gratitude we feel towards each and every one of you.
A message from our CEO, Angela Sheldrick
We are overwhelmed with gratitude. Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for giving so generously and helping us meet our Giving Tuesday goal.
It was an ambitious match — but it needed to be, for we bear an enormous responsibility. Elephant conservation is a long-term, multigenerational undertaking. As we raise the orphans of today, we must also work to ensure they have protected habitats to call home, now and into the future. With over 100 orphans currently in our care, plus hundreds more living wild and raising their own families, we feel the weight of our responsibility keenly.
With all the challenges in our world today, I am deeply humbled by your generosity as you continue to make space for our mission. When things feel uncertain on a global scale, the work happening at a grassroots level restores faith in humanity — ordinary people giving their all to make their corner of the world a better place.
Every single day, we see the best of humanity among our team, who have made conservation their life’s work. Their courage and dedication enable us to save wild lives, secure vulnerable habitats, and nurture the little orphans left behind. The Sheldrick Wildlife Trust is truly a team effort, and I couldn’t be prouder of the incredible men and women who bring our mission to life.
But most importantly, that team includes you. This Giving Tuesday, you once again enabled us to achieve our ambitious matched goal — a goal made possible by our faithful philanthropic partners, whose generous matching contributions lay the foundation for our year ahead. We are deeply grateful and indebted to you all.
Your contributions support our lifesaving conservation work, ensuring we have the capacity to answer the needs of the moment while expanding our field initiatives across Kenya. Even in favourable years — as this one was, following two years of devastating drought — we must always be prepared. After all, in the past few months alone, we have rescued nine orphaned animals, extracted more than 20 elephants from wells, fought dozens of fires, and conducted over 100 field veterinary treatments.
We can only imagine what challenges the year ahead might bring, but thanks to today’s outpouring of support, I am confident that we will rise to meet them.
For tonight, I just want to say thank you. Thank you for supporting our mission, following our daily stories from the field, and staying so wonderfully engaged in our work. Every day, I marvel at the people around the world who have rallied behind our cause and who make our successes possible.
You are the true heroes, so selflessly supporting our mission. We couldn’t be more thankful.
With gratitude,
Angela Sheldrick
Giving Tuesday is our most important day of the year. Every donation received today helps fund our ambitious conservation initiatives across Kenya, laying vital foundations for the generations of elephants who depend on our support.
Thanks to our generous philanthropic partners, all qualified donations and adoptions made today (3rd December 2024) will be matched dollar-for-dollar, up to $750,000. If we meet our matched giving goal, we can raise $1.5 million for wildlife conservation in a single day.
Donate Today
Percentage of US$750,000 match fund secured
Investing in the future:
As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.” Conservation is not for the impatient. It requires continuity and commitment, dogged perseverance, and field expertise that can only be gleaned through lived-and-breathed experiences. This is especially true when it comes to elephant conservation. After all, they are a species whose development and lifespan mirrors our own, whose children and grandchildren will be walking the earth in tandem with our own descendants.
Our dedicated, long-term approach to Kenya's wildlife and wild spaces, building brick by proverbial brick upon foundations that were laid half a century ago, defines the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust today. Kenya is a land of contrasts — there are good years and bad, times of bounty and want. We must always be prepared to pivot and adapt in order to answer the needs of the moment, while also forging ahead with a long-term conservation framework that will see us into the future.
Focusing on coexistence:
Looking forward, our focus is on coexistence. Humans may present the single greatest threat to our natural world, but we can also be part of the solution.
All our field conservation projects operate through the lens of coexistence. As we move forward, we will continue to hone in on this focus. Every single day, our teams work across Kenya to secure vulnerable habitats, support local communities, mitigate human-wildlife conflict, and help animals caught in need.
Generations of success:
By donating today, you empower us to enhance our conservation capabilities across Kenya — helping to ensure no orphan goes unrescued, no emergency unanswered, and no habitat unprotected. Reflecting on the past year, we’ve highlighted a few examples of coexistence-focused field successes, all made possible through donor support:
Our Most Complex Operation Yet: In the watery depths of a 45-foot-deep well, an elephant was barely visible. He was fully submerged, forcing him to tread water and use his trunk as a snorkel to breathe. He had been there for at least 12 hours and time was running out — but we had a plan.
Mudanda’s new baby, Miale: This year alone, we have met seven babies born to orphans rescued, raised, and rewilded through our Orphans’ Project. Mudanda, a first-time mom, made the long pilgrimage home during the dry season to give birth in our presence — an enormous honour.
A Race Against Time to Save a Mother and Daughter Elephant: During this dry season, we rescued more than 20 elephants from wells, from large bulls to mothers and babies. In this life-or-death situation, a mum and her tiny daughter had fallen into a well and were hopelessly stuck inside.
The Rescue of Orphaned Elephant Wamata: Wamata is one of our newest rescues. She was discovered during a routine aerial patrol, when our pilot spotted a gaunt young elephant standing alone on the Tiva River. Now, Wamata is one of the most spoiled members of our Nursery herd!
Equipping a Tsavo Community Hospital: Healthy communities and successful conservation go hand-in-hand. That is why we were honoured to donate a full suite of critical medical equipment to a community hospital in Tsavo, supporting our neighbours and boosting medical capabilities in the county.
Every elephant saved, every landscape secured, every field success story — that is your steadfast support and commitment at work. This Giving Tuesday, you have the power to double your impact, creating a lasting difference for wildlife that will be felt far into the future.
Donate Today
Rules of the Giving Tuesday matched giving campaign:
Start date and time: 00.01 AM GMT on Tuesday, 3rd December 2024.
End date and time: 11.59 PM PST on Tuesday, 3rd December 2024 (08:00 AM GMT on 4th December), or when the US$750,000 matching fund is exhausted, whichever comes first. If the matching fund is exhausted, this will be announced on this Giving Tuesday campaign page (sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/campaigns/giving-tuesday) and the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust social media accounts (@SheldrickTrust).
Matching conditions: Between the start and end time of the matched Giving Tuesday campaign, all online donations, including adoptions, made directly to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, and Sheldrick Wildlife Trust UK via our website (sheldrickwildlifetrust.org) will be matched. All online donations to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust USA will be matched dollar for dollar during the same period, up to a total matched fund amount of US$750,000, or until the end date/time, whichever occurs first.
Donations that will not be matched: Donations made before 00.01 AM GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) on Tuesday, 3rd December 2024, and after 11.59 PM PST on Tuesday, 3rd December 2024, will not be matched. Donations made after the matched funding runs out will not be matched. Direct Debits made via the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust UK will not be eligible for the match. Purchases from the SWT omerchandise shops will NOT be matched, as these are not classified as donations for auditing purposes. Donations to the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, Sheldrick Wildlife Trust UK, or Sheldrick Wildlife Trust USA via third party sources, including (but not limited to) JustGiving, Facebook, Instagram, CrowdRise, are not eligible for the match.