Activities

In order to reach its goals, Designathon Works deployed the following general activities and projects:

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BOARD

Board members had various moments throughout 2016 where they discussed and reviewed all of the activities deployed by Designathon Works:

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Internal organization:

• The board members decided that it’s time for the next phase of Designathon Works, meaning Martien Kuitenbrouwer and Marcel Kampman will step down as board members in 2017. Three new board members will be installed. The new board members need to have: financial, legal or non-profit expertise

• The team in charge of the daily operations is now consisting of: Emer Cronin, Ina Conkic and Neil Simmons

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Strategy:

• Approving a five-year strategy plan needed to be able to scale the foundation

• Defining and reviewing the Designathon Works pillars in order to aim for the most impactful initiatives

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Finance:

• The 2016 Financial Report will be published in the early 2017, and will be officially approved by the board

• Approved budget for 2017

• Re-defining the revenue models

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Fundraising:

• Support in building a steady relationship with recurring funders.

• Support in extensive funding applications.

 

Legal structure:

• Researching the best legal structure for Designathon Works

 

The board members have been very supportive of the Designathon Works team, who run the day to day business, by regularly checking in to see if enough progress has been made on all different projects and activities.

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PROJECT AND ACTIVITIES IN 2016
Further development of the Designathon Works pillars:

 

1. School program:
School program has been sold as a DW teacher training & DW School Kit.
30 schools in the Netherlands have done our school program and 4 schools are piloting it as a part of their curriculum. We have reached 3030 children and trained 267 teachers. We are in dialog with organizations in Singapore and Kenya about starting a school program in those countries.

 

2. Designathon events:
Bespoke designathon events commissioned by companies and organizations, have been held in the Netherlands, Germany, Philippines, Ireland, Uganda and Bangladesh.
Designathon themes include: Environmentally Friendly Transport, The Future of Cycling, The Circle Economy, The Future of Work, etc.
Through collaborating with businesses and institutions we are creating the network of like-minded partners and sponsors.
Each designathon event  is run under our license.

 

3. Global Children’s Designathon:
GCD is our flagship project. Through it we facilitate growth and spread of our methodology, receive media awareness, collect financial means to develop a new designathon theme.
So far we worked with 10 cities globally: Amsterdam, Berlin, Dublin, Nairobi, Panjim (Goa), Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, Tunis, Willemstad and Zagreb.

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GLOBAL CHILDREN'S DESIGNATHON

A day dedicated to celebrating what the world could be like when children design better futures using new technologies.
 

The annual Global Children’s Designathon event is our flagship project. During the event, held every year in November, children from all over the globe come together to work in parallel and design solutions for the better world. They discuss around the specific theme, build prototypes and present them to each other via a live connection, to the live audience and to the wider public via media.
In November 2016, during the second edition of the event, 300+ children from 10 cities around the world took part. The cities were: Amsterdam, Berlin, Dublin, Nairobi, Panjim (Goa), Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, Tunis, Willemstad and Zagreb.
Theme of the GCD 2016 was Circular economy.

The main focus of this event is to spread our message via different (media) channels in order to reach our target groups. The strategy involves inviting the captains in the fields of innovation, technology, sustainability, design and education to take the place in the GCD expert panel expert, or as a guest, and setting up interviews with them.

 

Have a look at the video reports & interviews of the GCD 2016 here.