Outreach

How to spell outreach

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce outreach

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does outreach mean?

1. nounAn organisation's activity of providing services or making contact with people in the wider community, especially those it does not normally reach.

Outreach in a sentence

• The charity runs a weekend outreach programme for homeless families.

• The hospital expanded its outreach to rural villages without clinics.

Where does outreach come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a transparent compound of two very old native English elements, the directional particle 'out' and the verb 'reach'. The verb 'reach' descends from the Old English ræcan, which meant 'to stretch out, extend the hand, or hand something over', and it shares roots with related Germanic words for stretching. 'Out' is the equally ancient Old English ut, signalling movement away from a centre. Joined together, the literal sense is 'a stretching outward', and as a verb 'outreach' once simply meant to reach further than something else or to surpass it. The familiar modern noun, describing an organisation's effort to extend its services and contact to people who might not otherwise come to it, is a much later development that grew popular in the twentieth century, especially in social work, charity, and education. Because every part of the word is plain English spelled the obvious way, the only real care needed is remembering it is one solid word rather than two.

How the word is built

• out- (beyond, outward)
• reach (from Old English ræcan, to stretch out or extend)