Nov 5 14
Education Above All and REFUNITE to Launch “m-Health” in Kakuma Refugee Camp
REFUNITE and Education Above All (EAA) to form a partnership A pilot project titled m-Health will be launched in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya REFUNITE’s co-founders will be in Doha for the announcement On November 5th 2014, Education Above All (EAA) will host an event at the Qatar National Conference Centre in Doha. REFUNITE’s co-founders will attend the event alongside organizations specialized in refugee assistance. As part of an ongoing effort to address barriers to education, EAA and REFUNITE will launch a pilot information project known as m-Health. This new initiative seeks to change the way information on health is…
Nov 5 14
What I Learned While Rapid Prototyping in a Refugee Camp
Zac Halbert is working as a Product Lead for a tech organization in San Francisco. He is also the American winner of the Global Hack for Good organized by Ericsson and REFUNITE. In this blog-post, he shares his experience creating a prototype for a ‘Messaging Wizard’ in Kakuma Refugee Camp I recently returned from an excursion to Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya. Kakuma is home to about 125,000 refugees from all over Sub-Saharan Africa. The goal of the trip was to build on the winning idea that was developed during the Hack for Good. During the hackathon, I created a mockup…
Nov 3 14
Introducing RefRoulette: Our Weekly Brainstorm Sessions
Welcome to RefRoulette, a session where advanced technology for displaced persons takes centre stage. Creative folks from REFUNITE have come up with an interactive way of getting members from different teams to collaborate and gain more insight into technology trends to help refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs). Introducing RefRoulette, a weekly brainstorm for REFUNITE team members from different countries. How can we leverage new technology in support of refugee families and IDPs? In the coming weeks, this question will be explored through various perspectives. How does RefRoulette work? Every Monday, the whole organization receives an email announcing the RefRoulette team…
Oct 29 14
Mapping the Future for REFUNITE
October 29, 2014 – In September, REFUNITE’s team members embarked on a trip to Nanyuki, Kenya, to innovate, collaborate…and have some fun! A five-hour drive from Nairobi on a Friday morning kicked off our 3-day team building trip. We left at 9am, the team in high spirits, enthusiastic about this great destination near the famous Mt Kenya. This is where employees drawn from the US, Denmark, and Kenya would collaborate and generate innovative ideas around prototyping. Staying true to our core, it did not take more than 30 minutes into the bus drive before some of our tech-team members pulled out…
Oct 14 14
Smart, Ericsson and REFUNITE to reconnect displaced Filipino Families through SMS
Smart Communications, Ericsson, and REFUNITE will launch an SMS disaster service for Filipino families. More than 4 million people have been displaced by the catastrophic Typhoon Haiyan, which hit the Philippines last year. The innovative SMS service allows Filipino families to take the search for missing relatives into their own hands, through a simple text message. Today, Ericsson Smart, and REFUNITE announced the launch of a new family tracing and reconnection service in the Philippines. The new SMS service, the first of its kind in Asia, will soon deliver hope initially to Filipino families separated by Typhoon Haiyan. The typhoon…
Sep 22 14
Five Failures that Helped Us Bring a Quarter Of A Million Refugees Onto Refunite.org
By Christopher and David Mikkelsen, Co-founders of Refugees United (REFUNITE). REFUNITE, Ericsson and partners have helped more than 350,000 forcibly displaced people onto their family reconnection platform. The award-winning platform empowers refugees to take the search for missing loved ones into their own hands, through mobile and web. In commemoration of Clinton Global Initiative’s 10 Year Anniversary, the two brothers and social entrepreneurs reflect on failures that led to radical new innovations. For the first time since World War II, there are more than 50 million forcibly displaced people in the world. From Syria to South Sudan, a refugee crisis…
Jul 7 14
REFUNITE Invited to Vodacom DRC’s World Refugee Day Event in Goma
July 7, 2014 — Vodacom DRC featured REFUNITE as part of their World Refugee Day event in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo. Staff from Vodacom participated in a celebration of the resilience of internally displaced peoples and refugees, complete with performances, dancing, and opportunities for attendees to register on the REFUNITE platform. Enjoy the photo essay below, featuring both the hard work and lively celebrations that made the day memorable. CONTACT Carolyn Nash, Communications Coordinator for REFUNITE (cn@refunite.org)
Jun 20 14
Safaricom, REFUNITE and KRCS Join Celebration of World Refugee Day in Kakuma Refugee Camp
June 20, 2014 – Today marked the commemoration of World Refugee Day 2014 in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, where Refugees United (REFUNITE) runs a mobile outreach program to reconnect separated families with Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS). In order to highlight the resilience, determination, and courage of men and women who are displaced by conflicts around the world, a wide range of organizations join forces in a celebration event organized by the United Nations Refugee Agency, UNHCR. Safaricom, REFUNITE and KRCS will participate in the event to showcase their innovate program pioneered in the camp between the three organizations,…
Jun 20 14
Two Rwandan Brothers Reconnect after Twenty Years Apart
The story below was recalled by Rwandan refugee Bandele.* The details described are accurate to the best of his recollection. Although he was still a child when the violence broke out, Bandele, a Rwandan refugee who now lives in Kampala, remembers a time his family lived in peace. When war ravaged his home country, Bandele was separated from his parents and siblings. For twenty years, he lived without knowledge of their whereabouts. But a chance introduction to REFUNITE led Bandele down a path to reconnect with his older brother. The two brothers continue the search for their other siblings and…
Jun 20 14
Pilot Project in Kakuma Refugee Camp Culminates in Short Films by Refugees, for Refugees
June 20, 2014 – Refugees United (REFUNITE) and FilmAid International are pleased to announce the launch of three short films produced in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya. The three films, released in Sudanese Arabic, Somali, and French, show how separated refugee families can take the search for missing loved ones into their own hands through a mobile device and through the REFUNITE family reconnection platform. ”Everyone has a right to know where their family is,” said Ida Jeng, Director of Global Communication and Strategy of REFUNITE. ”The families we serve have survived terrible hardship. Our goal is to focus on…
Hundreds of families are reconnected
through our work every month, often after years of searching for their missing loved ones.
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