SWIFT CURRENT
The Swift Current campaign focused on raising awareness, and promoting action against human exploitation issues, specifically child and sexual abuse. The overall aim of our campaign was to create conversations about these issues and the importance of bystander intervention. Our creative and experiential designs were focused on educating, and empowering the audience to stand up against abuse.
Research by the Sheldon Kennedy Child Advocacy Center (SKCAC) found that 95% of child abuse cases in Calgary are related to sexual assault (2012). These cases go unreported due to a lack of evidence, embarrassment, and pressure to maintain relationships between those involved. Primarily, we focused on targeting students at Mount Royal University, young athletes and young adults in Calgary, and aimed to give them the right tools and information to empower them to contribute them to creating a safer, and violence free community. One of our main objectives was to promote engagement from a male audience. Our clients proposed a challenge to increase male engagement with this issue, because based on their experience, males tend to avoid the topic.
Throughout the campaign, we utilized a sports theme in our creative and experiential designs to create that correlation between the issue, and the main event, being a screening of the Swift Current Movie. We utilized a variety of platforms to promote the event and awareness around the issue, including traditional posters, events, direct e-mail, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Our experiential elements were primarily utilized to engage the audience, and educate them on bystander intervention and violence prevention. We created opportunities for the public to become aware of these issues and take the first step in creating a safer community, by making their pledges, which were displayed throughout the campaign.
Majority of our campaign elements and initiatives led up to the screening of the Swift Current Movie: The Sheldon Kennedy story, which took place on November 7th at the Kensington Plaza Theater. We were able to accumulate various partners throughout this campaign, such as SKCAC, Calgary Sexual Health Center, Stepping Up as well as Brian Burke. These partners helped provide educational tools, support, and promotion through all of our initiatives.