Daniel Lubetzky

I just received an email from OneVoice Israel describing their Award Ceremony for the winners of the Imagine 2018 Essay Contest on the Israeli Side.  This event follows a similar one that OneVoice Palestine organized last month in parallel, in their case with the participation of the Chief Palestinian Islamic Justice and the Palestinian Minister of Education among others.

Here are excerpts of the Israeli letter:

Dear All,

OVI is happy to share with you the summery on the 2018 prizes ceremony and the launch of our new book "2018" (see cover attached).

The ceremony took place at the Tel Aviv cinematheque, during the international children film festival. We invited the 50 winners and their families, and 95% of them showed up.

The hall was packed with over than 250 people, while a few leaders left with no seat. The crowed was very heterogeneous and the kids and their families came from all across the country. We had kids from towns and villages, different refigures, boys and girls.

[I encourage you to read more by clicking below]

 

The atmosphere was really exciting and special.  Our new CEO Irit helped us a lot to set the event and to invite some famous figures to join us.  

People arrived around 13:30 and refreshments were served in the lobby. Our great leaders came around noon and helped with all the logistics (signing up the people that came, giving pins and tattoos of one voice, sighing people to receive more information about OV and some more technical things).

The minister of education Prof. Yuly Tamir honored us with her presence and stayed till the end. The lovely and charismatic Gilat Ankory led the ceremony with a lot of grace and Smadar Shir a famous Israeli author shared with the audience her experience as a young writer.

The ceremony started with the "Eye Opener" and right after that Gil made a speech and explained about One Voice and introduced Irit to the crowed.

After Gil speech, came the minister of education, Prof Tamir. Her speech showed allot of respect to "Imagine 2018" project and to OV as a movement in general. Apparently she spoke with the Palestinian education minister about the project and they both agreed that it was very important. At the end of her speech she even mentioned a specific story she liked (Sylvester and Twity) and spoke with the young writer from the stage.

We prepared two appealing "Imagine 2018" clips for the event.  The OVI clip showed the process we went through with essay contests; showing the kids and the workshop. The second one was a Palestinian clip that showed the same process they have been through. We were fortunate to have Dalia L. and Nisreen A. from OVP. Nisreen was reading a winning Palestinian essay in Arabic and we translated simultaneously. We also gave the opportunity to one of the Israeli writer (13 y/o) to read her story. It was very touching and moving.

In the end we had some kind of an honoring ceremony. We called all the 50 kids to the stage and gave them the new book, the camera and the honor certificate. Their parents and friends clapped hands and whistled to support the kids. It was very cheerful and joyful. The prizes were given to them by the minister, Smadar Shir, Irit and Gil.

Ben Or our PR, worked hard towards the event and two weeks before the event local magazines published the kids that won from their city and wrote about the project in general (a news paper from Tel Aviv wrote about the kids from Tel Aviv ). A week before the event major Israeli news web sites wrote about our event and our new book (Walla, NRG,Mynet Haaretz, Tapuz and more). Though it was Friday after noon (not a good time for media) we had 2 reporters that covered the event (Radio and a magazine).

Our leaders as mentioned at first were outstanding with their help on the event and when the event was over we had an intimate reception for them and gave them for Rosh Ha Shana a book with personal note from Roi Assaf.

The kids were very happy and exited about the ceremony and their families wanted to have more information about the movement. The people told us that the event was very exciting and well organized and all the kids wanted to know when we will pick the best 5 stories.

No need to metion that Smadar Shir and Gilat Ankory are a part of our family now as well!

Media coverage :

http://www.nrg.co.il/online/5/ART1/792/109.html#5634269

http://news.walla.co.il/?w=/6/1351251

http://kidsfestival.cinema.co.il/magazin/magazin.asp?catid=1&magazinId=18

http://www.habama.co.il/Pages/Description.aspx?Subj=4&Area=4&ArticleID=7265

http://www.mynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3598282,00.html

http://mail.makif.omer.k12.il/forum/index.php?topic=202.0

http://makomakan.cet.ac.il/Article.aspx?ArticleID=7df48ef6-ec3c-4f5f-9116-91286f9e6fc2&Language=1&PublishedDate=25/09/2008%2008:46:52

http://bidur.index.co.il/siteFiles/1/23/314836.asp?gate_id=239892

Yuli Tamir with one of the winners

Not only PMC… The minster of education is also wearing the ov pin….

Gilat Ankori and our Irit

Group picture ///