Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, 27 Sussex Place, Regent’s Park, London, NW1 4RG

T: +44 (0) 20 7772 6200 W: rcog.org.uk S: @RCObsGyn Registered Charity No. 213280

RCOG Challenge Event

Fundraising Pack

Thank you for joining Team RCOG to take part in a challenge to support better healthcare for women, everywhere.

Welcome to Team RCOG!

Every day, according to the World Health Organization, approximately 830 women around the world die from preventable causes related to sexual and reproductive health, 99% of these occur in low resource settings.

We are focused on ensuring that all women’s sexual and reproductive health needs are met, no matter what their circumstance

The money you raise will go towards the RCOG’s Centre for Women’s Global Health. It will be used to continue to develop training courses for health providers in low resource settings and to promote best practice in women’s sexual and reproductive healthcare.

Funds raised by people like you have been used to support programmes like the pilot of the Essential Gynaecological Skills programme in Nigeria.

This programme is so important because cervical cancer is the leading cause of death from cancer in women in developing countries. Cervical cancer is preventable and very treatable but this requires well trained healthcare professionals.

We trained 72 healthcare providers across six healthcare facilities in Abuja, Nigeria, in 11 essential areas including; cervical cancer, contraception and gender-based violence.

We will be with you every step of the way to offer support and advice. If you need any further information or support please contact us at development@rcog.org.uk

How your support will make a difference

It is time to start training and fundraising

There are lots of great training resources online, so get in touch with the team and they can share what has been used by Team RCOG supporters.

Now time for fundraising! There are so many different ways you can raise funds to reach your target. The key is to be as bold and as creative as possible.

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Funds could also be used to support programmes in Uganda, training healthcare professionals on emergency obstetric skills. So far we have trained 112 healthcare providers across five facilities in the Masaka district in life saving skills like neonatal resuscitation, using early warning score charts to monitor patients and the use of partographs during labour.

Find out more about our work rcog.org.uk/en/global-network/centre-womens-global-health/

The money you raise will help us improve the lives of women and girls by giving them access to timely, appropriate and quality care by confident and knowledgeable healthcare providers

“I have taught everyone on my unit how to use the early warning score system. They were happy because before you just used your head to decide who to see when but now you KNOW who needs more help than others. It’s helping our patients. It’s more accurate.”

Nurse – Abaji District Hospital, Abuja trained during the EGS programme

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“[From the training] I got all the skills I had gaps in, especially Manual Vacuum Aspiration and Early Warning Score, and I feel competent to handle everything from tomorrow!”

Healthcare provider - Masaka district, Uganda, trained during the ROS programme

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Planning is everything and the earlier you get started, the easier your fundraising will be. Add your fundraising deadlines, promotional ideas, events and people you need to contact onto a fundraising plan to get the most out of your fundraising experience

Fundraising

Online fundraising

The simplest way to ask friends, family or colleagues to sponsor you is to set up an online sponsorship page

Follow the Charity Checkout link on the Challenge Event

sign up page

Choose your fundraising target (some events have minimum targets but there are no maximums!)

Tell people why Explain why you are fundraising for RCOG and how any donation can make a difference

to the lives of women and girls. Personal stories mean a lot to people; tell people why this cause is so close to your heart.

Share your pageUse Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and tag #TeamRCOG. Email the link to your colleagues

or add it to your email signature to let everyone know the amazing thing you are doing.

Make the most of your page - #TeamRCOG

Fundraising page blurb – Feel free to personalise your story or use the below for inspiration

I will be taking on [insert event] on [insert date] to raise vital funds for RCOG Centre for Women’s Global Health programmes.

[Add your personal story. Why is women’s health around the world so important to you?]

Every day, approximately 830 women around the world die from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth, with 99% of these deaths occurring in developing countries.

The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) are determined to change this. They do this through driving up standards, with the highest quality training and education as well as speaking out on key issues, pulling on compelling evidence and decades of experience to raise awareness and, where needed, challenge the status quo.

[Personal story about training journey]

Please support me and RCOG. Any donation you can give goes towards making sure that that women across the world can have the access to the healthcare they deserve.

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Contact the press

If you are happy to share your story with the media, please email pressoffice@rcog.org.uk and they will contact you to discuss a possible press release. Local media are often interested in local doctors doing challenge events, and your trust will usually be very happy to share your story through their internal communication networks and social media channels.

Share your story

Take videos and photos throughout your training journey and share them. People give more to causes that are accompanied by stories. Tag #TeamRCOG in your posts to let us know what you are doing and add links to our website https://www.rcog.org.uk/en/global-network/centre-womens-global-health/our-work/ to show people how their donations will be used.

Video tips

When taking videos for social media, try your best to ensure you are in a quiet area unless it’s a clip of you running, cycling or trekking when the ambient noise adds to the effect! Try not to wobble the camera too much where possible and look to keep social media videos to a minute or less for maximum impact.

Don’t forget you are fundraising for one of the world leading women’s health organisations so make sure what you are saying is relevant and appropriate.

Other ways to fundraise

Everyone raises money in different ways and how you chose to do it is entirely up to you. Raising your target can seem daunting but if you split it between different types of fundraising activity it suddenly becomes a lot more manageable. Here’s a few suggestions for the different ways you could achieve (and maybe even beat!) your target.

1. Offline sponsorship forms – we can send an offline sponsorship form on request, please email development@rcog.org.uk

2. Matched giving – For the ultimate fundraising boost ask your employer to match the money. Get in touch with us to discuss.

3. Host a quiz night or a social event. Charge an entry per team and raise even more with a raffle on the night.

4. Have an office cake sale! Make it competitive and raise even more with a bake off. Tweet pictures to #TeamRCOG to inspire others

5. Birthdays and Christmas – Why not tell your friends and family that instead of buying you a present, the best birthday or Christmas present they could give you would be to support you in your challenge by sponsoring you?

6. Have a clear out – Marie Kondo your house and stick it on eBay.

7. Give something up – Maybe you could give up chocolate, wine or coffee for a month, a few months or a year? Donate what you would have spent on these to achieve your target – and improve your health at the same time!

Why get involved?Testimony Team RCOG Mount Rinjani

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“This trip was about something much bigger than any of us, but something that’s so important to all of us, improving maternal mortality in less privileged countries. Collectively we have raised a huge sum of money, but most of us also had a personal reason for the climb or a spiritual journey to take.

Yes there were tough parts, but when you do it with an amazing group of like-minded determined people, anything is possible. When we were apprehensive and perhaps nervous pre climb or during the challenging parts, music, singing and dancing became crucial for boosting morale and encouragement…and unfortunately for us there is video evidence of this, immortalized forever on social media!”

FAQs

Supporter materials

If you have sent your size and address to development@rcog.org.uk you should receive your free supporter shirt a few weeks before your event.

We are a small team and cannot provide collection buckets or other supporter materials. We can send some RCOG stickers to personalise your own. You can also use some of our online and printable resources to promote your challenge.

Using donations to pay your registration fee

You can raise funds to cover part of the registration fee, you must make every donor aware that you are doing this.

If a sponsor is connected to you, their donations only qualify for Gift Aid if you pay the full cost of the trip/challenge so that all the sponsorship money raised goes to the charity.

A ‘connected person’ is:• a wife, husband or civil partner• a brother, sister, parent or grandchild• the wife, husband or civil partner of a relative• a company under the control of the donor, or under control of connected persons

Cancellations

We understand that life is unpredictable and sometimes an event will be cancelled or you will have to drop out of an event. Usually we will not be able to refund registration fees or deposits but contact development@rcog.org.uk as soon as possible to discuss.

Minimum sponsorship

When you apply for one of our guaranteed places, you are signing up to say that you understand you will be committing to paying the relevant registration fee, and raising the relevant amount of sponsorship money.

If you are worried about reaching the sponsorship target for any reason get in touch with development@rcog.org.uk and the team will work with you to establish a means of you paying the money in to us.

It is important that you consider the commitment to the charity before you apply for one of the charity sponsored places - if you cannot reach the commitment, we would suggest that you enter the public ballot to your chosen event and try to get your own place - that way you will just be asked to raise as much as possible.

If you are doing an overseas challenge event and you are fundraising to cover the cost of your trip, then you will be required to pay in 100% of the cost of the trip around two months before your trip departs. Alternatively, you can choose to pay the trip costs yourself and fundraise as much as you can on top.

Under 18’s

We do not currently allow under 18 year olds to fundraise for us or donate to us.

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Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, 27 Sussex Place, Regent’s Park, London, NW1 4RG

T: +44 (0) 20 7772 6200 W: rcog.org.uk S: @RCObsGyn Registered Charity No. 213280

Thank you

Any more questions, please contact us: development@rcog.org.uk or 0207 772 6459. We are so excited that you are joining us on this journey and working together to

improve the lives of women and girls worldwide.