By Michael Mendoza | Operations Manager
Thank you once again for your continued support of SIMA! We’re excited to share our most recent updates from each of our programs with you.
SIMA Awards:
It's that time of the year again - save the date for SIMA 2020! We will officially open submissions for social impact features, shorts and virtual reality experiences in September 2019. We look forward to reviewing the impactful submissions!
SIMA Classroom:
Designed as a fast track to global citizenship education, the online streaming platform takes students on a journey from empathy and critical thinking to action. Over 1,847 educators, 43,816 students and 201 institutions globally are already using the platform.
Selected from the finalists and winners of the annual Social Impact Media Awards, SIMA Classroom is a global, ever-current and expansive streaming service presenting the gold standard of social-issue cinematic storytelling. It provides access to a carefully curated collection of over 165 award-winning short documentaries and Virtual Reality films with learning resources and participatory skill-building lessons.
In order to keep scaling the scope and depth of our impact, we launched an SDG Global Education Give Away in June which inspired 50+ applicants to share stories about their commitment to advancing the Global Goals in their classroom. We are pleased to announce the winner is RJ Sakai, Director of Social Innovation at Sequoyah High School.
This month, we proudly introduced the new SIMA Teacher Award. At the intersection of global citizenship education and media innovation, SIMA celebrates educators using this pivotal space as a catalyst for change. The annual SIMA Teacher Award will honor one exceptional teacher who has demonstrated an outstanding commitment to utilizing social impact media as a springboard for global education and meaningful community engagement.
SIMAx:
For the second year in a row, we partnered with World Merit to present our SDG Challenge! Individuals hosted screenings across the globe from Bangladesh to Thailand, South Africa to the UK, Malawai to Ghana, Burundi to Morocco (and more!) to inspire their communities to take action using the power of documentaries addressing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). More than 1,130 people in total took part in the global screenings!
SIMA's Fiscal Sponsorship:
Fiscal sponsorship is a formal arrangement with a nonprofit organization, such as SIMA, who agrees to sponsor a project that furthers our mission, for the purpose of fundraising through grants and donations. This alternative to starting their own nonprofit allows projects to seek grants and solicit tax-deductible donations for a creative social impact project, documentary or campaign, with the oversight and endorsement of SIMA, the world’s pioneering global social impact media agency.
We have since added four projects: Opera Ritrovata - small portable opera company with a sense of humor—dedicated to promoting unjustly forgotten works of women and minorities as well as fresh reinterpretations of currently canonic pieces, Patient Orator - a project emphasizing the importance of community by bridging the gap between public and private health, between policy groups, civilians, patients and care providers, FIIS - a street action festival that mixtures music, culture, and innovation, seeking to accelerate a cultural transformation for the common good—a festival where ‘TED Talks meets Glastonbury,’ and the power of innovative ideas resonate with the social rhythm of music and arts and, lastly, Full Emotions Arts Program - a project that runs different arts, cultural and education programs that connect artists to audiences.
SIMA Staff Pick:
We are giving audiences a barrier-free entry to experiencing social impact cinema and transforming the RAMA into the SIMA Staff Pick of the Month - streaming one doc/video at no cost to viewers through the SIMA Studios website.
For August, we are featuring Through The Wall, directed by Tim Nackashi and produced by Chelo Alvarez-Stehle and Tim Nackashi. The film is an intimate portrait of a family divided by the US-Mexico border.
This month we are also highlighting the incredible work of Freedom for Immigrants. Devoted to abolishing immigration detention, Freedom for Immigrants monitors the human rights abuses faced by detained immigrants through a national hotline and network of volunteers, while also modeling a community-based alternative to detention that welcomes immigrants into the social fabric of the United States.
“At this moment, tens of thousands of people — mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons — are currently languishing in a vast network of prisons and jails for no other reason than their immigration status. They remain separated from and deprived of everything they know: their loved ones, their homes, their communities, their liberty. We know that this system, which is profiting off their suffering, is immoral and goes against our values as a country. More than ever, we need to put an end to these cages and instead build solutions to welcome them into our country, treating them with dignity and respect. We need to work together to be done with detention.”
– Christina Fialho, Co-Executive Director, Freedom for Immigrants
As always, thank you for your invaluable contributions to helping us scale social impact through visual storytelling worldwide.
With warmth and gratitude from the SIMA Team.
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