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Background
Following the death of Charlotte (Char) Carroll Daniel in 2008, her family wished to honor her commitment to social justice and maternal and child health. They did so by creating the Charlotte Daniel Fund and an international award, the Charlotte Daniel "Champions of Change" Award at World Connect, which is given on an annual basis to a hospital, health center or community organization demonstrating the strongest commitment to improving the health and well-being of mothers and children.
"We wanted to choose a memorial that reflected her giving nature, her humanitarianism and her concern for social justice," father and sons agree. "And we wanted to give her young grandchildren and those to come a way of relating to her and loving her by understanding who she was."
Criteria for Consideration:
To be considered for the Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award, recipients must demonstrate excellence in improving the health and well-being of mothers and children, while having a proven track record of success and vision to build upon previous successes.
- Must be a current or past World Connect grantee.
- Must have met or exceeded initial project goals according to established project indicators.
- Progress and/or Final Report must have indicated improved health outcomes for women and children.
- Must provide a clear, detailed plan of how a supplemental grant would strengthen existing project.
- Must demonstrate how a supplemental grant will lead to project sustainability.
- Must document community involvement in leadership and managerial capacities.
- Must have a proven track record of outstanding stewardship of resources.
- Must share lessons learned, data and progress with World Connect in a timely manner.
Past Recipients
2018
In 2018, World Connect named The Maternity Guardian Shelter in Malawi the “Champions of Change” Award. This project took place under the traditional authority of Chief Kachindamoto, a woman who has gained worldwide attention for her focus on young girls and abolishing the practice of early marriage. World Connect worked on a nursery school construction project in 2018 with a CorpsAfrica Volunteer in the area, where we were first introduced to Chief Kachindamoto. After the successful implementation of the nursery school project, we spoke to Chief Kachindamoto about what other priority projects she sees in the area. The first thing she noted was that the Kachindamoto Health Center, which serves 20,000 people per year, is able to provide antenatal care services for women but is not yet cleared by the Ministry to conduct deliveries because it is lacking needed infrastructure improvements. Namely, the facility needed what they call in Malawi guardian housing, where women can rest before going into full labor. It also serves as a place where family members who accompany pregnant women, often after traveling long distances to reach the facility, can lodge if needed in a space that is separate from the delivery and recovery rooms. The project has the potential to impact the lives of more than 2,000 pregnant women each year, ensuring they can receive a complete package of maternity care in a quality and modern facility near to their home communities and villages.
2017
In 2016, we partnered with the Action for Women Foundation (AWF), a Rwandan-led community-based organization and a group of women, mostly single mothers, which AWF supports with income-generating activities and trainings. As we'd hoped, the first project was successful and motivating for the women. In 2017, we gave their AWF the “Champions of Change” Award. AWF used this award to provide bakery and business training to all 60 of its members, to purchase needed supplies and materials for a bakery, and to hire the top graduates from the bakery and business training to work in the newly established Action for Women Bakery. From there, 7 women began baking and selling daily in the Nyabisindu neighborhood of Kigali, offering a selection of cakes, donuts, chapati, and samosas to local customers. In the bakery's first six months, it generated an average monthly revenue of $1,7000! They sold an average of 16,000+ baked goods per month, with their highest month at more than 25,000 baked goods. The women involved in this project are now economically independent and can properly provide for their families.
2016
In 2016, World Connect named two “Champions of Change” Award recipients: the first is the Rwimitereri Health Center in Rwanda, the second the Kalomo District Health Office in Zambia.
In Rwanda, the “Champions of Change” Award will extend and complete the construction of a maternity ward at the Rwimitereri Health Center. The maternity ward will provide women in 25 villages with a population of 28,000 people with safe and clean place to give birth. It will also allow community health workers to share important health information with the more than 150 mothers who visit the Health Center monthly, but also to take health education, specifically maternal health education, out into and across the 25 villages.
In Kalomo District, Zambia, there are 31 health facilities serving more than 200,000 people. The Champions of Change Award will allow the District Nursing Officers to coordinate and lead a series of “cluster trainings”, where community health workers and community-based Saving Mothers Action Group volunteers from various health facilities will gather for advanced and refresher trainings on issues related to their work preventing maternal and child mortality. Specifically, they’ll be training to recognize and respond to postpartum hemmorrage, sepsis, preclampsyia and pregnancy-related hypertensive disorders, and training to work with mothers on HIV and family planning. The project is modeled on a successful set of trainings in neighboring Zimba District.
2015
The 2015 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award was given to the Youth Cooperative in Agriculture of Imouzzer-Kandar. The women in this impressive group have been steady growing their livestock business over time since their first World Connect project in 2013, which was focused on raising goats. They added sheep, chickens and cows, and even dabbled in beekeeping and honey. As part of their winning Champions of Change proposal, the women communicated to World Connect their dream to build a better stable for their animals, on land of their own, so that they could raise more cattle and enter into the lucrative dairy market in northern Morocco. They also expressed their desire to grow from 17 to 100 women.
2014
The 2014 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to the Association of Artisans of San Pablo, a women’s handicrafts association devoted to economic empowerment and equality for women in Peru. An original $500 grant from World Connect provided the women’s association with trainings led by local artisans and their own traditional weaving loom, called a telar. With a $5,000 grant from the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2014 Champions of Change award, the women purchased additional sewing equipment and materials, and organized more trainings and entrepreneurship workshops, enabling them to increase their capacity and advance their business. The women secured a formal market space in San Pablo and won a government-sponsored business plan competition, securing even more financing and resources.
2013
The 2013 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to Las Sartenejeñas Cooperative, a women’s co-op textile business dedicated to improving economic development and empowerment for women in Belize. An original $3,000 grant from World Connect provided supplies and business training, allowing a group of women entrepreneurs to launch the Las Sartenejeñas Cooperative. With an additional $5,000 grant from the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2013 Champions of Change award, the women were provided with more business trainings and a workspace (stocked with essential supplies and equipment), helping to increase the operational capacity of the business. The group, in partnership with the Sarteneja Alliance for Conservation and Development will be receiving a $50,000 business development grant from the UNDP’s Community Management of Protected Areas Conservation Programme (COMPACT), which will advance the business and demonstrate World Connect’s ability to leverage significant investments in local ingenuity.
2012
The winner of the 2012 award is the Singorwet Dispensary, a rural health clinic in Central Bomet, Kenya. The Dispensary originally received a $1,775.99 grant in 2012 from World Connect to increase the supplies available to provide more comprehensive maternity care to women in Singorwet. With additional funding through the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2012 Champions of Change award, the Dispensary will expand by building a complete maternity wing, train at least 10 local midwives, and improve the clinic’s rain water catchment system to ensure the availability of clean, potable water. Only 30% of Kenya’s health care facilities provide services for delivering children. With the expansion of the Singorwet Dispensary, women will have improved quality and access to pre-natal and ante-natal services and will place the community ahead of the health care curve. Currently, the majority of women in Singorwet have their babies at home, which is usually on the floor of a mud hut. Dangers from this include unsanitary conditions and a lack of professional health care staff in case of emergencies. In Kenya, about 7,900 women die every year while giving birth. These deaths can be prevented. The progress being facilitated through the Charlotte Daniel Fund will not only protect the immediate lives and health of mother and baby, but will help promote long-term health and poverty reduction by getting families off to a safe and healthy start.
2011
The 2011 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to the International Medical Equipment Collaborative (IMEC), an organization that works toward transforming impoverished communities around the world by providing equipment solutions for health care, agriculture, and education projects in developing countries. The Charlotte Daniel Fund awarded $19,800 to IMEC, which allowed IMEC to deliver $154,000 in essential medical equipment to Haiti to outfit the Les Palmes Health Center. The health center serves a number of surrounding rural communities that were badly affected by the 2010 earthquake, including the LaFond community.
2010
In 2010, the Charlotte Daniel Fund gave two “Champions of Change” Awards: the first to a community-based organization in Haiti, which has been a priority of the Daniel family and of Charlotte; and the second, to a small group of mothers and entrepreneurs in El Salvador.
The first 2010 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to The Lafonbelle Foundation, formerly “Friends of Lafond,” to finance a community health worker to help treat and prevent the spread of cholera in the small community of Lafond. Life in Lafond is centered around a school, the community’s first, which was constructed in 2003 and completely destroyed in the 2010 earthquake. The Lafonbelle Foundation rebuilt the school with support from World Connect. With their “Champions of Change” Award, they were able to ensure that each and every student at the school was educated in cholera prevention and equipped to take their newfound knowledge home to share with their families.
The second 2010 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to a group of women in rural Canton El Centro in the Cuscatlan Department of El Salvador. With an initial $2,500 grant from World Connect in 2010, a group of ten mothers in Canton El Centro received technical training in the processing of artisanal jams and marmalades as an income-generating activity. They also participated in a business training workshop, focused on basic accounting and market analysis. With their “Champions of Change” Award the mothers improved their business’ infrastructure by installing a water system and sewage system in order to receive their sanitary permit from the government of El Salvador.
2009
The first recipient of the Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award in 2009 was Hospital Municipal Villa Fundacion (HMVF) in the Dominican Republic. HMVF was recognized with this award for their “Partos Humanizados” project, to improve the quality of health services for pregnant women throughout the continuum of their care, from prenatal to labor to delivery to postpartum care.
Past Recipients
2018
In 2018, World Connect named The Maternity Guardian Shelter in Malawi the “Champions of Change” Award. This project took place under the traditional authority of Chief Kachindamoto, a woman who has gained worldwide attention for her focus on young girls and abolishing the practice of early marriage. World Connect worked on a nursery school construction project in 2018 with a CorpsAfrica Volunteer in the area, where we were first introduced to Chief Kachindamoto. After the successful implementation of the nursery school project, we spoke to Chief Kachindamoto about what other priority projects she sees in the area. The first thing she noted was that the Kachindamoto Health Center, which serves 20,000 people per year, is able to provide antenatal care services for women but is not yet cleared by the Ministry to conduct deliveries because it is lacking needed infrastructure improvements. Namely, the facility needed what they call in Malawi guardian housing, where women can rest before going into full labor. It also serves as a place where family members who accompany pregnant women, often after traveling long distances to reach the facility, can lodge if needed in a space that is separate from the delivery and recovery rooms. The project has the potential to impact the lives of more than 2,000 pregnant women each year, ensuring they can receive a complete package of maternity care in a quality and modern facility near to their home communities and villages.
2017
In 2016, we partnered with the Action for Women Foundation (AWF), a Rwandan-led community-based organization and a group of women, mostly single mothers, which AWF supports with income-generating activities and trainings. As we'd hoped, the first project was successful and motivating for the women. In 2017, we gave their AWF the “Champions of Change” Award. AWF used this award to provide bakery and business training to all 60 of its members, to purchase needed supplies and materials for a bakery, and to hire the top graduates from the bakery and business training to work in the newly established Action for Women Bakery. From there, 7 women began baking and selling daily in the Nyabisindu neighborhood of Kigali, offering a selection of cakes, donuts, chapati, and samosas to local customers. In the bakery's first six months, it generated an average monthly revenue of $1,7000! They sold an average of 16,000+ baked goods per month, with their highest month at more than 25,000 baked goods. The women involved in this project are now economically independent and can properly provide for their families.
2016
In 2016, World Connect named two “Champions of Change” Award recipients: the first is the Rwimitereri Health Center in Rwanda, the second the Kalomo District Health Office in Zambia.
In Rwanda, the “Champions of Change” Award will extend and complete the construction of a maternity ward at the Rwimitereri Health Center. The maternity ward will provide women in 25 villages with a population of 28,000 people with safe and clean place to give birth. It will also allow community health workers to share important health information with the more than 150 mothers who visit the Health Center monthly, but also to take health education, specifically maternal health education, out into and across the 25 villages.
In Kalomo District, Zambia, there are 31 health facilities serving more than 200,000 people. The Champions of Change Award will allow the District Nursing Officers to coordinate and lead a series of “cluster trainings”, where community health workers and community-based Saving Mothers Action Group volunteers from various health facilities will gather for advanced and refresher trainings on issues related to their work preventing maternal and child mortality. Specifically, they’ll be training to recognize and respond to postpartum hemmorrage, sepsis, preclampsyia and pregnancy-related hypertensive disorders, and training to work with mothers on HIV and family planning. The project is modeled on a successful set of trainings in neighboring Zimba District.
2015
The 2015 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award was given to the Youth Cooperative in Agriculture of Imouzzer-Kandar. The women in this impressive group have been steady growing their livestock business over time since their first World Connect project in 2013, which was focused on raising goats. They added sheep, chickens and cows, and even dabbled in beekeeping and honey. As part of their winning Champions of Change proposal, the women communicated to World Connect their dream to build a better stable for their animals, on land of their own, so that they could raise more cattle and enter into the lucrative dairy market in northern Morocco. They also expressed their desire to grow from 17 to 100 women.
2014
The 2014 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to the Association of Artisans of San Pablo, a women’s handicrafts association devoted to economic empowerment and equality for women in Peru. An original $500 grant from World Connect provided the women’s association with trainings led by local artisans and their own traditional weaving loom, called a telar. With a $5,000 grant from the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2014 Champions of Change award, the women purchased additional sewing equipment and materials, and organized more trainings and entrepreneurship workshops, enabling them to increase their capacity and advance their business. The women secured a formal market space in San Pablo and won a government-sponsored business plan competition, securing even more financing and resources.
2013
The 2013 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to Las Sartenejeñas Cooperative, a women’s co-op textile business dedicated to improving economic development and empowerment for women in Belize. An original $3,000 grant from World Connect provided supplies and business training, allowing a group of women entrepreneurs to launch the Las Sartenejeñas Cooperative. With an additional $5,000 grant from the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2013 Champions of Change award, the women were provided with more business trainings and a workspace (stocked with essential supplies and equipment), helping to increase the operational capacity of the business. The group, in partnership with the Sarteneja Alliance for Conservation and Development will be receiving a $50,000 business development grant from the UNDP’s Community Management of Protected Areas Conservation Programme (COMPACT), which will advance the business and demonstrate World Connect’s ability to leverage significant investments in local ingenuity.
2012
The winner of the 2012 award is the Singorwet Dispensary, a rural health clinic in Central Bomet, Kenya. The Dispensary originally received a $1,775.99 grant in 2012 from World Connect to increase the supplies available to provide more comprehensive maternity care to women in Singorwet. With additional funding through the Charlotte Daniel Fund 2012 Champions of Change award, the Dispensary will expand by building a complete maternity wing, train at least 10 local midwives, and improve the clinic’s rain water catchment system to ensure the availability of clean, potable water. Only 30% of Kenya’s health care facilities provide services for delivering children. With the expansion of the Singorwet Dispensary, women will have improved quality and access to pre-natal and ante-natal services and will place the community ahead of the health care curve. Currently, the majority of women in Singorwet have their babies at home, which is usually on the floor of a mud hut. Dangers from this include unsanitary conditions and a lack of professional health care staff in case of emergencies. In Kenya, about 7,900 women die every year while giving birth. These deaths can be prevented. The progress being facilitated through the Charlotte Daniel Fund will not only protect the immediate lives and health of mother and baby, but will help promote long-term health and poverty reduction by getting families off to a safe and healthy start.
2011
The 2011 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to the International Medical Equipment Collaborative (IMEC), an organization that works toward transforming impoverished communities around the world by providing equipment solutions for health care, agriculture, and education projects in developing countries. The Charlotte Daniel Fund awarded $19,800 to IMEC, which allowed IMEC to deliver $154,000 in essential medical equipment to Haiti to outfit the Les Palmes Health Center. The health center serves a number of surrounding rural communities that were badly affected by the 2010 earthquake, including the LaFond community.
2010
In 2010, the Charlotte Daniel Fund gave two “Champions of Change” Awards: the first to a community-based organization in Haiti, which has been a priority of the Daniel family and of Charlotte; and the second, to a small group of mothers and entrepreneurs in El Salvador.
The first 2010 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to The Lafonbelle Foundation, formerly “Friends of Lafond,” to finance a community health worker to help treat and prevent the spread of cholera in the small community of Lafond. Life in Lafond is centered around a school, the community’s first, which was constructed in 2003 and completely destroyed in the 2010 earthquake. The Lafonbelle Foundation rebuilt the school with support from World Connect. With their “Champions of Change” Award, they were able to ensure that each and every student at the school was educated in cholera prevention and equipped to take their newfound knowledge home to share with their families.
The second 2010 Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award went to a group of women in rural Canton El Centro in the Cuscatlan Department of El Salvador. With an initial $2,500 grant from World Connect in 2010, a group of ten mothers in Canton El Centro received technical training in the processing of artisanal jams and marmalades as an income-generating activity. They also participated in a business training workshop, focused on basic accounting and market analysis. With their “Champions of Change” Award the mothers improved their business’ infrastructure by installing a water system and sewage system in order to receive their sanitary permit from the government of El Salvador.
2009
The first recipient of the Charlotte Daniel “Champions of Change” Award in 2009 was Hospital Municipal Villa Fundacion (HMVF) in the Dominican Republic. HMVF was recognized with this award for their “Partos Humanizados” project, to improve the quality of health services for pregnant women throughout the continuum of their care, from prenatal to labor to delivery to postpartum care.