Since our Christmas Campaign, we have kept the charity Born to Thrive (BTT) close to our heart, fundraising and trying to help where we can. Earlier in the year we held a company competition where staff could apply for the opportunity to visit Rwanda and see the charity’s work first hand. We asked all applicants to donate a minimum of 36 hours of their own time to the charity and to record a short video detailing how they would use their time to help. The team are flying to Rwanda on 17th October and we will keep you updated on their progress throughout their trip (as and when they have Wi-Fi). Below Hannah, Uzoma and Laura explain what they hope to achieve on the trip.

Hannah Neenan
Senior Planner
I have known Katy, her passion for Rwanda and her dedication to setting up and establishing Born-to-Thrive for a long time before I even started working for Havas Lynx – so I was delighted when we chose this charity to support as part of our Lynx CSR initiative. And when the opportunity to be involved arose I jumped at it.

As a Lynx strategist with a passion for social media, I thought why not combine my passion and the power of social and utilise it for social good? Combining my skill set with those of my fellow Born-to-Thrive strategists we founded a four strong social team and have made it our mission to create and execute a complete social strategy for the charity to support the launch of its brand new website post trip. Social media is a powerful tool to reach a truly global audience – we want to blog, post, Tweet and Instagram to tell the Born-to-Thrive story to the world – driving awareness of the charities good work and gathering support.

Whilst in Rwanda I hope we capture all the content and material we need to ensure we effectively bring our social campaign to life. Meeting and hearing first-hand the stories of those whose lives have been positively affected by the charity will be a personal highlight for me. Beyond witnessing the great work of Born-to-Thrive on the ground, for me this is also a beautiful opportunity to explore a new country and a new culture. As someone who takes every chance in life to travel to new places, Africa is still the continent less travelled for me, and Rwanda, I am ashamed to admit, is not a country, that beyond the genocide, I know too much about. Prior to and during my visit I will make a concerted effort to understand the historical, political and social situation that surrounds the work of the charity.

Uzoma Nwaogwugwu
Community Manager
It’s pretty simple really – when it costs £250 to send a child to a school for a year how can you sit back and not get involved? We’ve all been lucky enough to experience a good education, it’s expected here, it’s mandatory. So when you have this as the norm how can somebody else have this as a privilege? School is the place where children meet other children, make friends, learn, socialise, grow, find their personality and discover what they’re good at.

What I’d love is for Born to Thrive to be in a position where sending a child to school is no longer a challenge, it’s easy. Simply because they have the support from individuals across the globe who understands how important education is, and become an advocate of the charity for this reason alone. I want people to become regular donators and have the opportunity to follow the stories of the children as they grow.

I’m excited to be part of the team who will help to create a brand for Born to Thrive and give the charity a voice online. I’m looking forward to capturing the stories of the children who, thanks to people’s generosity and kind heartedness have now been able to go to school.

Laura Millar
Planner
I didn’t know the Rwandan genocide had happened. There I said it, one of the greatest humanitarian crisis’ of modern times passed me by and I spent the past 20 years none the wiser. That’s the thing about living in a media driven society I suppose – if people are not talking about it, not reporting about it the rest of the world isn’t thinking about it.

My first inkling that I was missing something was when the company started supporting Born to Thrive and I learned about their purpose and mission. What the charity does and most importantly why they do it – did you know that between the genocide and AIDs pretty much an entire level of their population has been wiped out? Can you imagine if that had happened in our society? Where would you be? What would you be doing? We would all be in a very different place to where we are now.

This got me thinking, I am entrenched in this ‘media society’ I plan marketing campaigns for a living – can I use what I do on a daily basis for clients to help the people in Rwanda? To raise awareness of the charity and help grow their noble cause? The answer, after I had submitted a proposal to join the team, was yes. So here I am, planning the content for the  Born to Thrive campaign!

To find out more about Born To Thrive, visit their website:
https://www.born-to-thrive.org/

You can donate to Born To Thrive here:
https://mydonate.bt.com/charities/borntothrive