by Vanessa Goeh
The LEGO Foundation, in collaboration with Lever for Change, recently announced its five winners for the Build a World of Play Challenge, an open call grant competition for DKK 900 million (USD 117 million) seeking bold solutions promoting the well-being of children, their caregivers, and their communities, using culturally relevant and sustainable approaches. The social challenge seeks to address the early childhood crises aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as to create a global movement to prioritise early childhood development (ECD).
Ten finalists were earlier chosen from a pool of 627 applicants from 86 countries. Their applications were rigorously reviewed by a global team of multidisciplinary experts–including APC–based on their impact, practicability, community-centredness, and sustainability. The ten finalists were then allocated DKK 6 million to scale up and develop their proposed plan for implementation. Five winners were further selected in December 2022, with three organisations to be awarded DKK 200 million grants each, and two organisation receiving DKK 100 million.
APC Members may find the following high-quality programmes focused on early childhood development relevant to your philanthropic work, and may find these programmes of interest for further support.
Highlighted below are the finalist programmes that are relevant to Asia:
- Care to Play: Early Education for Pathways Out of Poverty (India)
by Indus Action, Saajha, Trickle Up, Rocket Learning, and IDinsight
This programme will provide capabilities of caregiving and opportunities for early education for more than five million vulnerable children in India, resulting in pathways out of poverty.
- Empowering Disabled Children to Play via Early Assistive Technology Access (Sierra Leone, Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya, and Indonesia)
By Clinton Health Access Initiative
This programme will empower disabled children by supporting governments to implement policies integrating screening, early access to assistive technology, and play therapy into health facilities and schools.
- PLAYFVL: Play and Language Access for Your Family through Visual Learning (United States and Thailand)
by Motion Light Lab and SKI-HI Institute
This programme will mentor parents of deaf children and enable them to support their children better by providing play-based resources and developing sign language skills for both children and parents.
- Scaling Community-Led Learning through Play for Refugee Children (Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, Malawi, and Malaysia)
by Cohere Charity in partnership with refugee-led organisations
A learning-through-play programme for refugee children to improve their literacy, numeracy, technology, social, and emotional skills.
Members interested to learn more about the finalists can reach out to Dana Rice, Vice President of Philanthropy at Lever for Change, at [email protected].
Full list of winners and finalists: https://www.leverforchange.org/challenges/explore-challenges/build-a-world-of-play
More information on the Build a World of Play Challenge: https://learningthroughplay.com/build-a-world-of-play/the-challenge.