Creating community is what we do. At Primed we share our learning and experiences together so we can all grow and connect with opportunity. 2021 was a difficult year for everyone but in our community, we focused on what we could do and are happy with what we could organise despite a global pandemic.
We’ve put together a list of 12 things that happened in our community in 2021. What could be on the horizon for 2022?
Nothing brings us more joy than connecting and expanding our community. Thanks to support from the local community and Recon Colombia we were able to start a new chapter of Storyteller formation in Moravía.
It brought us great joy to start to connect and grow our community and learn about all the amazing stories and personalities that make up Moravía. We’ve been working hard with some motivated individuals and also helping local initiative strengthen their offer to provide an amazing, immersive and sustainable community tourism experience. You can find out more here.
The world had to respond to various restrictions over the past few years, including the transition to online/virtual spaces. Our community thrives off interaction but we rose to the challenge of transferring our immersive community to an online platform. Since starting in 2019 we have created our own bilingual learning platform that includes life skills and personal development.
We were lucky to be accepted as one of the finalists in an international grant process with Social innomarathon/socialab as part of SAP.
Despite not taking the crown we were privy to some amazing support and assesory to help us to continue to refine and improve our project.
Thanks to a recent connection with Compaz, the foundation for peace founded by Nobel Peace Laureate Juan Manual Santos, we were able to connect with some amazing social entrepreneurs froms around Colombia. Our director had the priveledge of sharing a Storytelling workshop with 9 entrepreneurs from the Amazon region thanks to this connection and we’re hopeful that this relationship continues to grow and provide support and opportunity to the Compaz community.
Now being part of the Recon community for the past few years we had the privilege of attending the third national summit for social entrepreneurship in Bogotá, Colombia.
During the summit we were able to share a project pitch, updating our story and sharing our plans to grow our community over the next few years. Can we connect with 5 new communities in the next 2 years?
2021 saw a big increase in our presence in the local media. Thanks to various processes including our formation with Recon Colombia and Socialab we were able to appear in:
We’re always looking to expand our community and we had the opportunity to start the first stages of community vinculation and investigation in a new chapter of Storytellers in Rio Sucio, Caldas. We also started and maintained various other conversations about starting the project in:
- Termales, El Chocó
- Girardota, Antioquia
- San Rafael, Antioquia
- San Pedro de Milagros, Antioquia
- Puerto Nariño, Las Amazonas
- Various chapters in Comunas and Corregimientos en Medellín
Primed’s home is in the community but we always need a place to base our work from and provided a nice environment for our team. We moved into a new location in 2021 only 2 blocks from our other previous locations.
Our amazing new space includes various artistically decorated classroom, a library, dance/yoga space as well as an amazing 3rd floor terrace where we will be holding our upcoming language exchanges.
After a long virtual hiatus we were able to get back to doing what we love- connecting with our community. We returned with in person/face to face events like parcharte, our community classes, and language exchanges.
Parcharte in December was a special event where we had dance clases, rap, opera and other music all on display from talented members from our community. We also had the opportunity of including our graduation ceremony from our recently started community classes in Moravia.
We had an amazing time in our new home in Moravia thanks to the support we received from our local allies. We took part in some traditional novenas which were shared with the kids from the district in the days leading up to christmas. Over 20 volunteers helped us create a special day for approximately 70 children from Moravia and surrounding areas. Thanks to our international allies like Unity SME we were also able to help provide gifts to over 200 kids at the end of the novenas.
Thanks everyone for your support!
New allies connecting to our community like:
- Sapiencia
- Secretaria de education
- Mesa Codigo Medellín
- ACI Medellín
- Compaz
- Socialab/SAP
- United Planet
- Ruta N
- Compaz
- Forte
- Parque Educativo Innova
These allies in addition to our existing community.
Through our new connection with Compaz we were able to participate in the Feria ‘Hecho en Paz’ to show Storytellers and it’s impact on communities in situations of vulnerability.
Our team and the storytellers connected with other entrepreneurs of peace from the compaz community to offer their products and services in Medellín.
Thank you to everyone that has made this year possible, who have believed in our vision and supported us on our path.
Looking forward to a 2022 full of opportunities!