2020/2021 Winners & Shortlists

Why is this work relevant for Media?

Social Media has become the most consumed and used medium today for people to express themselves. With people showcasing their lives in quirky ways through various social media challenges. While most challenges are for entertainment, especially on TikTok, it decided to take a stand and #CreateForGood. Teaching people the basics of sign language through social media and creating a movement on this media to create a better world for hearing and speech impaired individuals.

Background

The Middle East has 20 million hearing and speech impaired individuals. While most initiatives revolve around helping them directly, no action has ever been taken to make the society around them more inclusive. Sign language helps them communicate with each other, but speaking to someone who doesn't know sign language (which is most people) makes leading a normal life rather difficult.

Describe the creative idea / insights (30% of vote)

#CreateForGood is a social media challenge that teaches people how to talk to the hearing and speech impaired in sign language.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

Challenges are extremely popular on TikTok, so we decided to create a unique one that became a social media movement. We created a challenge #CreateForGood with lyrics for a song, but the words did not make sense, until a person used sign language to sing. Every TikTok user who participated ended up learning the basics of sign language. And we did not stop there. With Red Crescent’s support, we created a petition to introduce sign language as an elective subject in middle schools across the region. Every video uploaded on TikTok using #CareForGood automatically counted as a signature on this petition.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

Step 1: We created a unique Eid themed song with lyrics that seemed out of place. Other than Eid greetings, the lines had common phrases like "Hello", "How are you?", "Nice to meet you", "Welcome", "Thank you" etc. The song by itself doesn't quite make sense. Until you decide to take the #CareForGood Challenge on TikTok. Where we ask people to create videos of them singing the song, but by only using sign language. Step 2: We brought on board sign language experts who translated the entire song into Arabic Sign Language guides, which were then sent to TikTok’s official celebrities who became the first few to take on the challenge. Step 3: Every TikTok user who created a video following what the celebrities did, ended up learning how to say the common phrases in sign language. Giving them the ability to actually interact with someone who is hearing

List the results (30% of vote)

10000 videos uploaded in 2 weeks 10000 signatures on Red Cross's petition 28000 new app downloads 62 million views 118 million in reach 33 million in exposure