ICS wins Klaus J. Jacobs Best Practice Prize 2016

ICS-SP, our local ngo that implements the Skilful Parenting program in Kenya and Tanzania, has won the prestigious Klaus J. Jacobs Best Practice Prize 2016! Jacobs Foundation, the Swiss foundation that hands out these awards annually, chose the Skilful Parenting program "for it's unique model, being an example of best practice, highly relevant for the broader area of child development in deprived rural contexts." The prize is endowed with 200,000 Swiss francs.

Beatrice Ogutu, director of ICS-SP in Nairobi says: “In Kenya, two out of three children experience physical violence during childhood, and in Tanzania almost three quarters of children are victims of physical violence during their childhood, often by the hands of their parents. Our Skilful Parenting program targets at mothers, fathers and other caregivers. It starts from local perspectives on parenting and familyrelations and it builds on community structures. We combine it with our agribusiness program. The results are therefore not only increased farmer productivity but also improved family relationships and more equal gender roles."

Since 2009, the Jacobs Foundation annually presents two awards for outstanding achievements in research and practice in the field of child and youth development. ICS is incredibly proud that the Jacobs Foundation recognizes our work. The prize money will be used to further strengthen the evidence base and program design, and to seek new partnerships within the public and private sector to achieve our ambition of reaching 1 million parents and caregivers by 2020.

The 2016 awards were presented on December 2, at a festive ceremony at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. Below you can watch a short film, on the approach and impact of Skilful Parenting, that has been shown to the audience at the award ceremony: