A lot has happened in the past three months. We got off to a rocky start when in early April, our staff, partner organisations, and friends in Timor-Leste were affected by devastating flash floods which hit the country hard.

We’ve now bounced back, and have a lot to be grateful for. Key things we’re celebrating:

• Two of our staff members raising over $52,000 for flood relief following the severe flooding in April!
• The app we developed as part of our Hamahon program is now live in Timor-Leste! It helps women and child victims of violence and their advocates connect to services to assist them.
• We’re just about to expand our Pacific eLearning Program to 20 schools across the Pacific!

Funds raised for flood relief! 💪

When floods hit Timor-Leste in April, they caused landslides and destruction, and displaced more than 10,000 people. Two of our staff members, Sonia and Kara, took some of the five days of community service leave we offer our staff every year and worked with two others to set up a GoFundMe for flood relief.

Remarkably, they were able to raise over $52,000 USD. This money was used to help fund solidarity kitchens, to feed displaced people in evacuation camps, and to provide water tanks to communities that badly needed clean water. We’re grateful to have staff that are so passionate about making an impact in the lives of others, in and outside of work.

Hamahon app is now live! ⛱

The Hamahon program helps Timorese women and child victims of violence and their advocates reach services to assist them. Services include police and ambulance, shelter accommodation, legal help, counselling, and financial assistance.

As part of the program we developed an app with our partners that contains an up-to-date list of options available to victims as well as a questionnaire which guides them to a particular organisation that can best meet their needs. There is also a microlearning courses and additional resources feature on the app for those wanting to learn about topics related to violence against women and children.

Service providers can themselves learn things related to their work and take courses on wellbeing through this feature. They can also use the Hamahon app to submit information on the cases they receive each week to the government, which is intended to improve national data on violence against women and children in Timor-Leste. Last week, we ran training sessions for service providers on how the app can support them in their important work of helping victims.

Hamahon was developed in partnership with Nabilan and the Government of Timor-Leste, all thanks to funding from Australian Aid.

Pacific eLearning program is expanding! 🤓

To learn more about our Pacific eLearning program, hear it here from our partner Wintec, who we’re working with alongside Nanogirl Labs, all thanks to funding from New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

We’re hiring! Details below👇

Until next time…

Thanks for reading. We hope you’re also kicking goals in your own life.

If you’re interested in learning more about what we get up to here, jump onto our website and take a look around!

For more updates on our projects and our general musings, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. For anything else, drop us a line at info@catalpa.io.