Welcome to 2026!
Hello and welcome to 2026.
We’d just like to say a huge thank you for all your support throughout 2025 – it really was the most incredible year.
Having had some time to reflect over Christmas, you really start to appreciate the sheer scale of the year and actually how much we accomplished as a charity. It was our most successful year for sure, but in terms of connections made and further exposure, it really pushed us to the next level.
It’s incredibly humbling to recall all that we did, but also what everybody else did too – and that gave us real hope for the future seeing so many different people and groups step up and want to do something for us. That’s the future of A Shining Light really, those people coming through and wanting to carry us that little bit further along on our journey.
We won’t talk on 2025 too much more, because we have a film all about it! That’s right, a film! Produced by Fly Girl Films, ’21 for 21′ documents the entirety of last year and simply celebrates every aspect of it. It shows all of our events, providing a nice glimpse into some of those that weren’t public or local, as well as some lovely words from Luke’s family, friends and former teachers.
Before eventually making the film public, we will first be holding a very special premiere event at Howden School on Thursday 12th March. Tickets are completely free and can be claimed in our online shop right now!
Looking forward to the year ahead, despite promising a quiet start to 2026 we have already been doing some work with the school and the Young Enterprise competition. This academic year we have sponsored three teams to take part in the programme and joined them for their first Traders Market event at St Stephen’s in Hull last week. Chris also caught up with an old school friend of Luke’s, Harrison Ells-Fontana, who is proudly sponsored by the charity for his 2025/26 season with Hessle RUFC. And we also attended and supported the Howden Methodist Church’s Pancake Day event where we were the very grateful recipients of a £425 donation.
As you may have seen from our socials already, this year we are supporting Liv Stocks, Luke’s former classmate, with her project to take on the ‘world’s toughest row.’ Liv, along with university friends Meg & Jen, are attempting to become the world’s youngest female trio to row 3,000 miles across the Atlantic. As a charity, in partnership with the school, we have pledged to raise £3,000 this year to sponsor the team’s oars, which will then return to Howden as a memento of their incredible achievement. Liv’s chosen charity for the race itself is A Shining Light. Our donation from the Pancake Day event will be going straight to that project, as will the £148.50 raised by Howden students at a recent Valentine’s Bake Sale at the school.
Still to come, our charity football team, ASLFC, will be taking on Goole Athletic in a fundraising friendly on Sunday 1st March at Howden School. Kick-off is at 10.30am and spectators are welcome. We’ve also been shortlisted for Charity of the Year in this year’s Goole & Howdenshire Business Awards – Ryan & Chris will be attending the awards night on April 10. Leo Bliss of Bishop’s Bar, Howden will be running the London Marathon in support of us on April 26 and in May we’ll be travelling down to Poole, Dorset when ‘Stevo’ the boat is officially christened as preparations for Liv’s challenge intensify.
Beyond all of that, we’re competing in the York Rotary Dragon Boat Race again on July 12, our second golf day at The Oaks is taking place on August 14, and we’ll be hoping for another sold out show when Elvis visits the Howden Social Club on November 28.
Thirteen events already locked in. So much for a quiet start to the year…
Keep shining everyone x