Contributing to equal opportunities for every child

“Bollebozen was set up to give children access to books and technology – our two main areas of expertise at bol. We now work all year round setting up exciting activities and cool events for children. And particularly for children who would not normally have easy access to these things. We help them discover great stories, experience special outings and develop their personal and digital skills.”

Bollebozen is now divided into four categories, each with its own initiatives and ways of working together with others. Hente: “One of these categories is ‘volunteers’ – my favourite – where we organise excursions for children four times a year. All employees at bol can sign up to go out with the children. It never ceases to amaze me that – within next to no time – we have more than enough volunteers to give the kids a great day out.”

At bol, the Bollebozen team, also known as the Bollebozen Circle, gets together once a month to discuss potential events and initiatives. As programme manager, Hente leads these meetings, keeps track of the budget, organises the events and the related marketing. She’s also responsible for the ‘donations’ category.

You might think that Hente has a full-time job with all the work she does for Bollebozen, but besides this, she’s also bol’s Communications Manager for Sustainability.

“Before I joined bol, I worked for the Hema Foundation, which, just like Bollebozen, is committed to helping children with low literacy. The Sustainability Communications Manager job at bol, combined with responsibility for Bollebozen, was therefore right up my alley. My role for Bollebozen has grown over time, and that’s really because of my own initiative and enthusiasm. And that’s why I love working at bol; there’s always an opportunity to take on something extra and to keep developing professionally and at a personal level. When you see an opportunity and then actively discuss it, you find that almost anything is possible within this amazing company.”

Over the past few years, Hente has organised many special events and set up cool initiatives under the Bollebozen flag. All were designed to create equal opportunities and a bright future for new generations.

“Of course, we see that technology is playing an increasing role in our daily lives, and we realise that children will have to deal with technology more and more. So we also have a Bollebozen category in which we devise activities to encourage children to develop their digital skills. For example, we recently organised a fantastic robot camp, during which the children learned to write simple computer programs and we invited them to spend the day at our bol office. We’re currently setting up a special ‘Girls Tech Day’ so young girls can take a look at the world of technology too. And we hope their tech day experience will encourage girls to consider a career as software engineer or data scientist.”

We mustn’t forget that ‘books’ is also a major pillar of the Bollebozen programme. This category gives children access to language through books and stories. Hente: “I have particularly special memories or our Christmas holiday initiative. Together with street football hero Soufiane Touzani, rapper Dio and singer Metejoor, we organised a fantastic event in the Netherlands and Belgium. Children could play letter football, language games, and write a song or rap. All the children received the bol Winter Reading Pack with books and games to help keep them interested in reading and language – even during the holiday period.”

Although balancing two jobs can be challenging at times, Hente really loves her job here at bol. “What do I enjoy most about my job? That’s an easy question. I have the freedom to organise the most exciting activities. I can draw on my knowledge and experience every day and the best part is, that I can make children happy. That’s the perfect combination, if you ask me.”