Life had been challenging post the Covid Pandemic and coming out of 2022. We continued to progress and grow at a steady pace, always focused on our mission and goal, investigating the best ways to get there and be of service to humanity.
The committee looked at their strengths and weaknesses during 2022 and as we commenced 2023, we realised that even though we had many great skills and much life experience between us, our skills in the digital world and raising funds needed some help. We attempted to do some social media courses but quickly realised it was not the best management of our time.
A friend made a wonderful suggestion to put an ad on Seek Volunteers and we have been blessed with forming a hugely skilled and enthusiastic Social Media/ Marketing committee. They have been working hard on establishing our brand and a FUOS brochure and posting regularly on Facebook and Instagram. Also creating a posting and content calendar on Google drive. We are learning lots too and are so thankful to all our volunteers.
We decided to trial our first attempt at a Giving Tuesday Campaign for not for profits in November 2023 and we received some donations and also got people’s attention. We looked at this as a successful first campaign. We plan to participate in the Giving Campaign again in 2024. We are also very thankful to our website developer and hosting person who is always ready to help with any tech difficulties and sharing ideas. We have realised that we have been a bit lax in posting blogs to update our public and we now have a volunteer interested in helping to write content and blogs sharing our information in a more-timely manner.
In late August 2023, the Friends Under One Sun’s President, travelled back to Uganda, self-funded, to visit some hospitals and the communities where we have land and want to establish our medical centres. She also had meetings with our Ugandan Director and Project Manager. You can check out an expanded blog on this trip.
Lastly for 2023, we decided to create a sister corporation in Uganda, to partner with us. It consists of an Australian Director, a Ugandan Director, Ugandan nurses and doctors as secretary and members. It has been set up by our Ugandan lawyer and will operate as a Community Based Organisation (CBO). We named it Ohana Lifecare Initiative. Ohana means community/family!