The Jubilee Centre is the lead partner of the Global Innovations for Character Development (GICD) Platform which offers capacity building support to Templeton World Charity Foundation (TWCF) grant-funded projects primarily located in low- and middle-income countries.
The Centre works alongside partners in the USA at the Institute for Research on Youth Thriving and Evaluation at Montclair State University, New Jersey, and at the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development at Tufts University in Boston.
The TWCF Global Innovations for Character Development initiative is the first-of-its-kind and seeks to establish character development as a lever for social change. By promoting character strengths as educable attributes intrinsically connected to human flourishing, TWCF recognise the critical place of virtues such as compassion, gratitude and honesty in the lives of both individuals and communities.
The GICD Platform ensures all grantees have access to pioneering theories and approaches to character development. The Centre has coordinated a varied and project-led approach to delivery to suit a wide variety of grantees. As such, the Platform is user-responsive, and activities are generally undertaken in partnership with the leaders of GICD funded projects. Activities have included: expert-led webinars, peer-to-peer dialogues, round table events, one-to-one consultancy and in-person events.
By ensuring grantees can access leading research in the field and receive specific feedback on their project, the Platform supports long-term impact. Through helping grantees to build sustainable models of implementation, the Platform contributes to the value of the grantee’s current project and beyond in terms of knowledge development and capacity building of on-the-ground teams for the future.
Facilitating the exchange of contextually relevant knowledge and skills is vital and the Platform has connected projects with one another to build regional communities of cutting-edge practice in character development. This has culminated in face-to-face convenings in Columbia and Kenya enabling grantees to form productive relationships and prepare for scale and sustainability.
For further information about the GICD projects see here