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Through Child Friendly Australia NAPCAN is developing connecting potential donors to small projects aimed at making a difference to the lives of children in disadvantaged communities. In 2005 NAPCAN awarded a total of 96 small grants to a diverse range of communities and/or individuals to enable their work involving and engaging community responsibility for children's wellbeing.
A Microgrants Program would have direct and immediate benefits for communities, and vastly assist the long term work of Child Friendly Australia:
Challenges communities to think about and articulate what they need to support children and families
Shows communities that there are people outside of their network who care about them
Gives donors immediate gratification - they know absolutely what their money has achieved - so they are encouraged to come back and repeat the exercise
Signals to the adults in a challenged community that they are not alone and that if they think about what they need and ask for it, their request will not just feed into a huge bureaucracy but will be dealt with in a very tangible way
Signals to children in these communities that there are adults outside their own immediate world who care
A simple way all Australians can get involved and take responsibility for children's wellbeing
The introduction of a national and robust Microgrants Program has enormous PR potential to increase awareness of Child Friendly Australia and clearly enforces our belief that the answer to preventing child abuse lies in strengthening communities.
Successful Microgrants Programs have been run in South Australia , Queensland , Tasmania and ciurrently in New South Wales as part of the program MORE. Utilising these grants, communities implement initiatives that benefit children and progress the community towards being a Child Friendly Community.
Microgrants are a significant program co-ordinated by for National Child Protection Week each year. Applications for NCPW 08 are now open. MORE
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