2026 Kindness Report highlights sport’s role in granting life-changing wishes

Make-A-Wish Australia released its Kindness Report for Sport 2026 last month, highlighting how sporting organisations across the country are helping bring life-changing wishes to critically ill children.

Make-A-Wish Australia CEO Sally Bateman said the report is a chance to recognise the organisations that help deliver those moments, with sport remaining one of the most popular wish experiences over the past four decades.

“The Kindness Report for us is an opportunity just to say thank you to the amazing organisations around the country that come together to support our wish programme,” she said.

“Over the last 40 years for Make-A-Wish, sport has always been one of the perennial favourites for our wish kids.”

“And I think the Kindness Report for us just demonstrates what an amazing job some of these sporting clubs do in bringing wishes to life in partnership with us and creating just the most amazing experiences for some of these kids to remember forever.”

Bateman pointed to standout examples featured in this year’s report, including AFL experiences that left lasting impacts for children facing critical illnesses.

 

 

“I think the wishes, particularly with Nick Daicos and Collingwood, were just amazing for Logan,” she said.

“He had the most amazing experience getting to go to training, meet the players, meet the coach, have the opportunity to be on the ground and just really feel part of that environment.”

“I think for kids facing treatment, just that ability to have something to look forward to is so important.”

“And I think when it’s your heroes running around and they’re the ones that stop, I think it’s all the more powerful.”

Bateman said the emotional impact of the wishes extends well beyond the moment itself.

“We talk about them as a moment, but these wishes stay with these kids and families forever and they’re memories to cherish from childhood,” she said.

Closer to home in the Northern Rivers, she highlighted the fundraising efforts of Brunswick Heads swimmer Edward Mason, who completed a 27-kilometre swim in New Zealand’s Lake Tekapo earlier this year to support the organisation.

“He swam 27 k’s over eight hours in New Zealand to raise money for us,” she said.

 

 

“I think for us, even our wish kids, seeing these sorts of fundraising efforts, I think everybody just feels the spotlight sort of comes on and everyone’s really proud of what many of these fundraisers can do.”

Bateman said demand for wishes continues to grow.

“I think the numbers at the moment, there’s around 18,000 kids who are living with a critical illness, so the need is continually growing for us at Make-A-Wish,” she said.

“We exist to do something for the kids right now who have got an illness.”

“We all wish that there wasn’t so much illness in childhood, but the demand does grow each year, and obviously, for us as a charity, we’d love to be able to reach more kids.”

Bateman said the experiences gained from the wishes provide an important sense of hope and joy for children facing uncertainty.

“A lot of these kids, the future can be uncertain, and the wish and these experiences is really, again, designed to help them have hope and also just have that joy that so many of us take for granted in childhood.”