SIGN LANGUAGE WEEK 2026
The Big BSL Fundraiser
This March, we’re calling on our supporters to take on a personal challenge and raise vital funds to fuel our work — advocating for sign language rights, celebrating Deaf culture, and making sure every deaf child grows up with full access to their language from the very beginning.
This Sign Language Week, the British Deaf Association is calling on our supporters to take on a personal challenge and raise vital funds to support Deaf-led change. Every challenge helps fuel our work — campaigning for BSL rights, celebrating Deaf culture and heritage, and fighting for a future where BSL thrives.
Why March?
The Big BSL Fundraiser turns Sign Language Week into something practical and powerful: a chance to show solidarity with the Deaf community and help make long-term change possible.
This is about hands, language and expression — showing we are United in Sign
Will you:
- Sprint for Sign Language?
- Bungee for BSL?
- Leap for Language Equity?
- Cycle for Community
- Climb for connection?
- Swim for Signing Pride?
FREE WATER BOTTLE FOR EVERY PERSON WHO SIGNS UP!
Your challenge can be physical, creative, expressive or reflective — if it stretches you and helps raise funds for BSL, it counts.
This is more than a fitness challenge — it’s a chance to celebrate BSL, show Deaf pride, and the strength of a community United in Sign.
Every challenge you complete, and every pound you raise, helps us champion sign language and Deaf culture, strengthen the UK’s signing communities, and bring BSL into the hands of every deaf child who needs it.
Take part this Sign Language Week.
Your challenge. Your support for BSL.
British Sign Language is visual, expressive and embodied — and this fundraiser reflects that. Choose a challenge that fits your life, your body and your relationship with language. There is no single way to take part.
Please raise a minimum of £150 for the BDA to enable us to continue to advocate for BSL equity. As a token of our appreciation, we will enclose a free BSL in Our Hands water bottle!
You might:
- Complete a daily challenge for the whole month of March
- Set a hands-based or movement-based challenge that works for you
- Gather your friends and go on walks or play games for the BDA
Will you pledge to raise a minimum of £150 to support our work?
Funds raised during The Big BSL Fundraiser support the British Deaf Association to:- Campaign for BSL rights and language equity
- Champion Deaf culture, heritage and community spaces
- Advocate for early access to sign language for deaf children and families
- Ensure BSL is not only recognised in law, but used, valued and passed on
Make it meaningful
You could:
- Complete 135 kilometres, steps or bounces to honour 135 years of the British Deaf Association
- Share a daily Sign Language Week moment across March
- Challenge yourself to learn signs connected to rights, culture, family or identity
- Set a personal goal that reflects why BSL matters to you