There are 21.3 million refugees worldwide, half of them children, many of whom are out of school or struggling to get a quality education. While efforts have been made to address this problem, the international community has yet to commit and sustain the resources needed to solve it.
One approach towards a solution is to inspire visible constituencies of people to take action in support of refugees, thereby creating an enabling political environment that allows for governments to enact real and lasting legislative change.
Enter the Olympics: as the world’s most-watched global event, the 2016 games created more than 30 billion viewing hours of broadcast television, with an opening ceremony watched by upwards of one billion people. With the announcement of the first Refugee Olympic Team in history came a huge opportunity to educate and inspire a new, mainstream audience around the refugee crisis through an unexpected lens, the universal appeal of sport.
A set of social media graphics to be shared by supporters before, during, and after the athletes’ events
This summer, Purpose partnered with UNICEF and UNHCR to build a global fan base for the Refugee Olympic Team. The effort was joined by a range of partners in the humanitarian sector and beyond, including International Rescue Committee, Save the Children, the ONE Campaign, Theirworld, World Vision, Sesame Street, FilmAid and others.The hashtag, #TeamRefugees was built to provide people all over the world a way to show support for these ten athletes, as they, like all refugees, are incredibly courageous and resilient.
In the first week of launch, public figures ranging from President Obama to Justin Trudeau to Malala to Grover to even the Pope showed love for #TeamRefugees. Throughout the Olympics, the campaign continued to draw in new fans and reached over 500 million impressions. The brand and symbol for Team Refugees that fans could unite behind gave supporters a way to show their support online and offline with a common hashtag, team swag and a team symbol.
The campaign received the second largest spike of the year in positive twitter mentions of refugees. The #TeamRefugees tag accounted for 60% of all positive twitter sentiment about refugees during the Olympics. This video produced by the campaign showing the inspiration and motivation that Team Refugees provides received over 1.4 million views. There were murals created in Rio highlighting #TeamRefugees. In a month, Team Refugees had already reached 10% of the size of Refugees Welcome, and 73% of Team Refugees tweeters have never used #RefugeesWelcome.
Murals were created in Rio depicting Team Refugees. Public figures ranging from President Obama to Malala to Grover to even the Pope have all voiced their support as fans of the refugee team!
The metrics show that the #TeamRefugees campaign is one of the strongest attempts yet at creating an online and offline identity that people who identify positively with refugees can rally around. We will continue to grow this community and engage its energy on other aspects of the refugee crisis beyond Rio.
Um guia digital de combate à desinformação.