At The Shindig last week, we invited our supporters into our Bright Ideas Lab – where the walls were covered with 60 discoveries, opportunities, solutions and projects – all generated by Child.org in 2019.
Guests were given three different kinds of sticker to stick on the Bright Ideas they were more intrigued by: I Love This So Much, Tell Me More Tell Me More, and We Have to Change This. I promised to update you all with more information about the ideas that attracted the most interest on the night.
I Love This So Much Top Five
Here are the posters that prompted the most people to use their sticker to say “I love this so much”.
1. Designing a new way to reach mums with safe sleeping information
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The Child.org Baby Box programme can feel like it’s all about giving nice boxes to families. In fact, at its core, our Baby Box programme is about arming mums with the health information they need to keep their baby safe. Knowledge about safe sleeping is a key indicator. The change in the level of understanding between the baseline (pre-programme) survey – when just 7% of mums knew a baby was safest sleeping on thier back – and afterwards (43%), showed that the information was reaching mums who participated.
The Baby Boxes used in our pilot in Nairobi were printed with safe sleeping information on the lid, and this information was also communicated at the postnatal care session that each mum had to attend in order to receive her box.
If you love arming mums with information, join Team Mum Monthly to fund more of Child.org’s work with mums and newborns. You can read the Baby Box Pilot report in full here.
2. Ohh, what’s occurrin’? A Gavin and Stacey Spectacular Pub Quiz
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Our guests at The Shindig were particularly excited to learn that the Retold Productions team have added Gavin and Stacey to their regular schedule of Spectacular Pub Quizzes.
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Tickets for the quiz are on sale here.
Spectacular Pub Quizzes made around £8000 profit in 2019, providing a valuable stream of unrestricted funding for Child.org. Ohh what’s Occurrin’? was launched just half way through the year and is already proving a very popular theme – raising around £1000 of that profit. It is currently trending as one of the Top Five Events on Design My Night!
3. Remarkable Tours goes international
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Shindig guests were also very excited about us launching our popular Remarkable Tours in other countries. This is all down to a hugely successful partnership with our friends at Airbnb.
As Amy announced on stage at The Shindig, over 6000 people came on Remarkable Tours in 2019, raising around £70,000 in profit for Child.org. The team are now planning tour launches in Dublin and Amsterdam, and are working with Tyson in our Nairobi office to create Kenyan tours too.
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In 2019, we won the Airbnb social impact award for our Remarkable Tours, which are all delivered exclusively through their platform. You can check out the current list of Remarkable Tours here – do get in touch with Beth (beth@child.org) if you’d like to discuss booking a bespoke tour or experience!
4. Pregnant Women’s Groups launch in Meru
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There was so much love in the room for our Pregnant Women’s Groups, launching in Meru THIS WEEK. Last week, The Child.org Kenya team were in Meru to run training with the Social Mobilisers who run the groups:
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Each social mobiliser received a pack to help them run the groups, including referral forms, a Session Guide (which works as a visual aid) and a Social Mobiliser Guide which explains how to perform the role and contains a wealth of information about safe pregnancy and early motherhood. They also each received a crocheted boob, created by Namsi.
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These groups are funded by your Team Mum fundraising in 2019 – and matched funding from the UK government through Uk Aid Match.
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Our programming team are also hard at work creating the next iteration of our Pregnant Women’s Groups. This new version is designed to run in Siaya county, an area of Kenya where new mums are facing different challenges. We’re hoping to fund this programme in 2020 with a brand new Team Mum Campaign, launching in September. If you want to help, sign up for the November Ride Africa, plan to Sell One Thing from your home and donate the proceeds during the Team Mum appeal, or email me ellie@child.org to ask about how to support!
5. Working with Ruby Cup to provide menstrual cups and health education to school girls in Narok
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Child.org formed a partnership with Ruby Cup in 2019, providing sustainable menstrual health solutions to women and girls. Ride Africa riders on our All-Women Team Mum ride were there to help with this first distribution!
The team in Kenya have created a design for a new iteration of our HealthStart programme, to operate in Narok, Kenya. This version of our school health programme has Ruby Cup distribution built into the design, alongside a programme of education. If we can secure funding to launch this programme, we hope to change the impact of periods on girls’ education in these schools (supporting more amazing young advocates like Zulea!)
More Bright Ideas…
Those are the top five ideas that our supporters at The Shindig considered most worthy of their “Love This…” stickers. Want to see what they chose to stick these stickers on?