MissingSchool received donations of $13,988 during the past financial year while not actively seeking donations from the public.
Google Impact Challenge Australia
In June 2015, MissingSchool developed a proposal for submission to the 2016 Google Impact Challenge Australia, which offered a substantial prize pool of up to $750,000. The proposal was to set up an Australian-first telepresence robot pilot in the Australian Capital Territory. In the reporting period, MissingSchool developed the proposal concept and proposal, and set up a partnership including VGo Robots (USA), ARACY as an evaluation partner, and Dentsu Mitchell as a media partner. We garnered political support for the proposal and support from ACT Education. MissingSchool was shortlisted but not successful in this application.
Navitas
The Navitas Education Trust was established to support education projects in communities where a little can go a long way. MissingSchool submitted an application for a 36-month telepresence robot pilot but was not successful.
St.George Foundation
MissingSchool wrote, pitched and secured the St.George Foundation’s new Inspire Grant of up to $600,000 over three years which supports innovative interventions that change the course of children’s lives. MissingSchool was awarded the grant to run a national telepresence robot pilot, using a systems approach. The pilot will place telepresence robots in willing schools to demonstrate that continuous two-way connection is possible between seriously sick kids and their classrooms when they are absent, missing school.
St.George Foundation funded MissingSchool’s research, released in 2015, which revealed a gap in education provision and prompted the first Commonwealth-funded research into the issue for sick kids. The telepresence robots will be a proof of concept for the solution, and commenced in the ACT in September 2017 before national rollout.
Pro Bono Contributions
MissingSchool acknowledges that we have been able to achieve a lot with very little because we have attracted high value contributions in pro bono work. These have primarily been provided by the volunteer Management Committee, with the support of others. Examples include administrative support from Mia Gilmour, probono inputs from education consultant, Jenny Lavoipierre, probono bookkeeping services from Casey Taueki, reduced fees for Theory of Change consultation with Sarah Jones, and discounted pricing from Neucode for website development and Adelle Chang for website design. MissingSchool acknowledges with gratitude the power of these contributions in assisting our achievements.
