Promote conservation in 15 Caribbean islands!

Dear Partners:

We are excited to soon be on the air! With an early August launch date across the Caribbean, we are preparing and distributing material to promote the radio drama Callaloo. A HUGE thank you to all radio stations that have agreed to broadcast the 208 episodes of Callaloo free of charge across the Caribbean.

We are excited to announce that working with our new partner, InMobi (www.inmobi.com), we have launched our first ever mobile advertising campaign. Our Callaloo ads are live and during the last two days have been shown 300,000 times on various handsets and platforms in the region with over 3000 clicks to our facebook page.

Please help spread the word by 'Liking’ and ‘Sharing’ the Callaloo Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/CallalooRadioDrama

We are so grateful for your continued support!

IN OTHER NEWS:

• Tyrone Buckmire, the newest member of our Caribbean team, visited St Lucia on 21-23, June. The trip allowed Alleyne (Program Manager), Tyrone (Program Officer) and Della (Program Assistant) to focus on an determining an approach to strengthening the coalitions once Callaloo is on air.

• Evaluation expert, Peter Vaughan, has designed a top-of-the-line monitoring and evaluation strategy to ensure effective program messaging. A revised Survey Plan and Questionnaire are being circulated with partners around the Caribbean and will be implemented in three countries - St Lucia, Tobago and Grenada or BVI - shortly after the program goes live.

• We are also pleased to announce a new partnership with KfW, on behalf of the German Financial Cooperation, to undertake the CARISMA II: Regional Mass Media Soap Opera Edutainment Project. The CARISMA II aims to improve knowledge, attitudes and behaviors with regard to HIV prevention among youth, across the existing 12 My Island countries, plus Barbados, Belize, Trinidad and St Martin. The partnership will help to:

1. Strengthen the existing sexual and reproduce health and HIV/AIDS story lines in Callaloo
2. Expand My Island-My Community to a 15 country program
3. Result in working with existing and new partners to coordinate the integration of HIV and broader sexual and reproductive health themes into other existing radio and television programming in the Caribbean.

The partnership leverages existing, powerful Entertainment-Education platforms, infrastructure and networks; capitalizes on an extensive investment in trainings, teams, and baseline and formative research as well as enables significant cost savings, economies of scale and potential to enhance impact of My Island-My Community and CARISMA.

Links:

• Learn more about My Island - My Community here
• Read news coverage about the program
• Read a first-hand account of this program's importance