French start-up Sport Heroes Group (formerly Running Heroes) has joined UNICEF in the launch of a global sports initiative to engage people in the organisation’s work for children’s rights. Sport Heroes Group uses the data generated by running apps and online technology to build sports communities, encouraging mass and bespoke participation.
Sports enthusiasts worldwide can sign up for free to Team UNICEF – Get Active for Children, an enterprise that aims to engage people around the world to help guarantee children’s rights, by enabling participants to unlock a corporate donation upon completing 5km on foot or by wheelchair.
Participants can also accumulate points by exercising and accomplishing other activities, including completing a quiz about children’s rights on the Team UNICEF platform. The participants with the highest number of points compete for a chance to win rewards, including a trip to see UNICEF’s work first-hand in Brazil (international travel is not included) for the top performer.
Team UNICEF Get Active for Children is compatible with RunKeeper, Strava, Nike+, Runtastic and MapMyRun. Users simply need to connect their app to the platform by registering with an email address and password. This process is only necessary once; after that, runs will be automatically synchronised with the platform.
“We want everyone to get into the sporting spirit and Get Active for Children to help raise vital funds for UNICEF’s work for the world’s most vulnerable children,” said UNICEF’s chief of communication and partnerships in Brazil, Edith Asibey.
CEO and co-founder of Sport Heroes Group Boris Pourreau said, “After our first two Connected Events with UNICEF last year, we were contacted by the Brazilian branch to run a tailor-made event during the Olympics to help raise donations to protect children in Brazil. This project immediately made a lot of sense and we are proud to help UNICEF achieve its goal of 50,000 participants making donations, thus creating one of the largest sport events worldwide.”
Team UNICEF Get Active for Children is supported by Ogilvy Brasil, CAF (the development bank of Latin America) and Save the Dream.
Sign up for free here: teamunicef.org/home
