August has been an incredibly inspirational month. As we reflect on our activities, we’d love to take you through some of our initiatives:
- It all starts with a home: Summer exhibition of our crisis shelter at B. Amsterdam
- How I found my purpose at People for People: Meet Roderick Vernooij
- Student letters to unaccompanied minors elicit emotion and hope for the future
- Inspiring kids to dream: Sharing the stories of our role models
- We held our biggest Rolling Aid Event ever at the Olympic Stadium!
- Our impact in numbers: School bags and essentials to support learning ⚡
Looking forward:
- Sign-ups to join People for People at the ‘’Dam tot Dam loop’’ still open!
- Going back to Morocco to provide longer-term shelter
It all starts with a home: Summer exhibition of our crisis shelter at B. Amsterdam
This summer, B. Amsterdam invited us to set up a demo of our new crisis response shelters, designed by Better Shelter, in front of their building.
Visitors were able to learn more about the innovative design that makes these units easy to set up and durable enough to provide long-term shelter to people forced to flee their homes. We also shared our vision behind this new strategy which we plan to introduce this year starting with a mission back to Morocco in October to provide shelter for people who are still living in tents and temporary shelters a year after the earthquake hit in 2023.
Didn’t get a chance to visit our exhibition? Not to worry!
Our shelter will be moving indoors so people can still visit it at B. Amsterdam as the weather turns colder!
Follow us as we share more updates on the reopening!
How I found my purpose at People for People: Meet Roderick Vernooij
The widespread impact we’ve been able to achieve as People for People is all thanks to the motivated heroes on our team who bring their talent and empathy to each project.
This month, in our People behind People for People series, we put the spotlight on Roderick Vernooij, our Operations Manager who found his purpose at People for People.
Roderick will now be leading People for People’s newest project to provide sustainable, longer-term emergency shelters for people in crisis situations, thanks to our partnership with Better Shelter. This way, when a crisis hits, he can use his handy talents to ensure more people have a place where they feel safe.
Read more about Roderick’s journey with People for People which has taken him across the Netherlands and to Morocco after last year’s earthquake.
Student letters to unaccompanied minors elicit emotion and hope for the future
Back in May, we collaborated with Young Impact on a project for Freedom Day where they challenged students at Laurens Lyceum in Rotterdam to consider what freedom means to them.
After sharing more about our work with unaccompanied minors and the struggles they face to reach a place where they can be free, the students wrote 178 messages of warmth and support to distribute at our upcoming events.
Each time we’ve visited a location for our Rolling Aid Events, we’ve brought a batch with us to distribute to the kids. This has brought beautiful reactions from these children who are so often overlooked by society.
There was one recently that said, “Your presence is a blessing. We are grateful for the light you bring into this world,” which brought smiles and tears to the eyes of an unaccompanied minor and a volunteer translator, who is also an asylum seeker.
It’s beautiful to see just how big an impact a simple message of kindness can bring. In a world of division and “us” vs “them,” the purpose of our growing community is to bridge these imaginary lines and reach out to each other as friends, neighbors, teammates, as People for People.
We will continue our partnership with Young Impact as they introduce this activity at more schools across the country. Stay tuned for more heartwarming messages. 💌
Inspiring kids to dream: Sharing the stories of our role models
In the run-up to our Play to Dream Rolling Aid Event (see below), we focused on the powerful impact that role models can have on kids, especially unaccompanied minors who, having already undergone difficult journeys to get here, face the pressure of having to make it in a new environment on their own, all before the age of 18.
We want to ignite their hopes, dreams, and motivation by showcasing stories of asylum seekers who, despite the odds, made it to the top of their field.
One way we did this was by creating video interviews with People for People’s Ambassadors, Olympic Judoka’s Muna Dahouk and Mohammed Rashnonezhad, where they shared their stories and a personal message to the kids. We shared these with COA locations so they could play them for the kids in the run-up to our event.
We also put a spotlight on one of our volunteers, Zaher Shalhoub, who came here from Syria in 2015 and built a successful catering business. Alongside his passion for food, he never gave up on his love for sport shooting and continues to take part in competitions across the world with the hope of one day making it to the Olympics.
Read more about his inspiring story here.
One of the amazing things about People for People has been getting to know all of the incredible people who have been attracted to our mission. They serve as a testament to what we’ve always believed: united, we can make a difference.
We held our biggest Rolling Aid Event ever at the Olympic Stadium!
This month, we took our Rolling Aid Events to the next level with an Olympics edition held at the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam. We had over 100 unaccompanied minors from three locations across Amsterdam join us, our energetic volunteers, and our role models for a day of sports and games.
Here are some of the activities we did throughout the day:
🏅Bonding sessions and a creative workshop around the ‘Play to Dream’ theme
🏅Connection over a warm lunch inspired by dishes from different cultures
🏅Opening of ‘the Games’ by our Olympic athlete ambassadors
🏅Olympic sports and workshops including: a Judo workshop by Muna, volleyball, athletics, shot put, high jumping, and a People for People Triathlon!
🏅End of the games medal ceremony 👏
It was a day full of fun but also great emotion as we saw the kids standing proud with their medals at the end of the event.
One of our team members spoke with some of the boys after the event. They were all smiling and wearing their medals. One boy said, “This day was amazing.” Another said, “It was so nice to connect with my friends.”
AT5 also joined us and reported on the event with a video and article. Check them out here.
As we reflect on this amazing day we shared together, we want to send a heartfelt thanks to our partners for helping to inspire dreams.
Our impact in numbers: Schoolbags and essentials to support learning
During August, we continued to strengthen our support for unaccompanied minors at locations across the Netherlands, not only through connection and inspiration but also by providing the essentials they need. This includes hygiene products (toothpaste, toothbrushes, shampoo, deodorant, etc.), clothing (t-shirts, pants, underwear, socks, shoes, sports clothes) and school supplies (backpacks, pens, pencils, rulers, notebooks) to support education.
We also donated laptops to locations so they can set up stations where the kids can get access to the internet for schoolwork and Dutch lessons.
This month, we supported kids in Velsen, Zwijndrecht, Bloemstraat, WOW Hostel, and Tafelbergweg with the following items:
- Toothpaste (120), toothbrushes (126), shampoo (18), soap (120), and more
- School bags (90), water bottles (114), school supplies (513)
- T-shirts/sport shirts (394), pairs of socks (74), shoes (91), and more
- Laptops (15)
We also handed out goodie bags at our Play to Dream Rolling Aid Event to each of the kids with a fanny pack, Tony’s chocolate bar, Bidon bottle, and socks.
A team of volunteers from RVDB joined us in our warehouse this month to help pack school bags for kids in Katwoude. Want to learn more about how you can organize a team building activity with a purpose? Reach out to us here.
Looking forward:
- Sign-ups to join People for People at the Dam tot Dam loop still open!
We still have some tickets left to join the People for People team on the Dam tot Dam run across Amsterdam and Zaandam on Sept. 21 – 22, 2024. Runners will be collecting donations we can use to purchase school supplies for the schools we will build in Morocco this October. 📚
Who will join us? 🏃♀️
10 Miles (Sunday): We have 1 spare ticket for the 10 miles, if anyone want to join, claim it HERE
5 Miles (Saturday): We have 8 confirmed registrations and 7 tickets left. Claim it HERE.
- Going back to Morocco to provide longer-term shelter
With our new crisis response strategy underway, we plan to go on another mission to Morocco in October where we can provide shelter to people who are still without homes since the 2023 earthquake. More information to come soon!
