In 35 crisis-affected countries, humanitarian emergencies and protracted crises disrupted the education of 75 million children between the ages of 3 and 18. Education is crucial for both the protection and healthy development of girls and boys affected by crises. It can rebuild their lives, restore their sense of normality and safety, and provide them with important life skills. Through its Education in Emergencies programme, the European Union helps these children to have access to safe, quality and accredited primary and secondary education.

challenges

Against this backdrop, the European Commission approached logos to develop a  digital awareness-raising campaign about the relevance and effectiveness of the EU’s support for education in emergencies. Beyond the digital engagement solution, logos also conceived and implemented an attractive launch event for the campaign.

The aim was to create an immersive and interactive event that would:

• Inform the audience about the challenges posed by emergencies for the education of children across the world;
• Showcase the successes of the European Union’s Education in Emergencies programme;
• Celebrate the EU’s pioneering and leading role in Education in Emergencies;
• Involve high-school teenagers (14-18 years old) in the launch of the digital campaign;
• Cement the perception among young audiences (and beyond) that education in emergencies is a fundamental issue.

The challenge was to organise an interactive yet high-level event that would combine inspirational speeches, testimonials from the field, digital interactions with the audience, live musical performances, as well as the broadcasting of short films.

solutions

logos and MCI Brussels joined forces to create an unprecedented phygital experience to launch the digital campaign. Both teams had to work the clock to draw up a concept and implement it in just eight weeks! Everything had to be ready for the 14 May in the morning.

First, our creative team came together to develop a concept for the event to be approved by Commissioner Stylianides. The approve concept would then serve as a brief for the production teams to create a magical event. logos first instructed a recording crew to travel to Colombia, Turkey, Afghanistan and Uganda to shoot live images of education projects in emergencies and interview local teachers that would later be interviewed on stage during the event.

logos also contacted 30 schools in the Brussels region to secure the active participation of 400+ students and their teachers during the high-level event. A fine balance between French and Flemish-speaking schools had to be sought among the 12 schools selected by the Commission. The event was thus trilingual in French, Dutch and English.

logos then sourced two Belgian pop singers – Axelle Red and Typh Barrow – to join the event as campaign ambassadors. logos managed the details of their performance with their respective managers to ensure delivery would be as smooth as possible. logos then hired a professional TV anchor with whom to fine-tune the scenography and finalise the minute by minute script of the event. logos made the most out of its experience in speaker management by preparing a detailed briefing and script for the journalist and moderator using online polls with the audience, conducting touching interviews with teachers in the field and inspiring speeches from high-level actors. All these elements led to a lively and varied experience for the audience thanks to the setting up of a real-time interpretation and translation system in four different languages (EN, FR, NL, ES).

logos briefed MCI to create a unique stage in one of the auditoriums of BOZAR, Brussels’ centre for fine arts. The set-up work would have to be done overnight as the auditorium was booked until late the previous day. With its usual magic, MCI Brussels worked around the clock and transformed BOZAR overnight into a classroom-like stage with a blackboard, books and desks.

results

On 14 May, the launch event gathered:

• 400+ high-school students and teachers from French and Flemish-speaking schools, as well as European School of Brussels;
• High-level speeches from luminaries such as Nobel Prize laureate 2018, human rights activist and gynaecologist Dr Denis Mukwege and European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides;
• Popular singers such as Axelle Red, Belgian singer and songwriter, and Typh Barrow, Belgian singer, songwriter, composer and pianist;
• RTL TVi’s journalist and moderator Sandrine Corman, Former Miss Belgium;
• Inspirational interviews and testimonials from two teachers, Sandra Rodríguez, Project Manager of the EU-funded Casa Marista Un Corazón sin Fronteras, in Colombia and Leke Emmanuel, teacher and collaborator in an EU-funded project run by Save the Children, in Uganda.

services

event concept and design, speaker and programme management, event branding and audience marketing, offline and online interactions, asset development