Our Impact in 2020-2021
Thanks to our amazing supporters, we’ve supported 135 prisoners of conscience and an approximate 280 additional family members from 27 countries
We helped 5 families reunite, which included 13 dependants, and 11 refugees in exile requalify in the engineering, legal, technology, medicine, healthcare, construction, pharmaceutical and human rights sectors.
To read our 2021/21 impact report please click here.
“Prisoners of Conscience gave me a new life and I will forever be grateful. My life and achievement are a testament to the amazing work you do to change lives, offer hope where there is hopelessness, and enable and empower people like me with knowledge and skills which they can use to impact the UK society and beyond.”
-Victoria*, teacher and activist in Zimbabwe
Impact measurement
Our first formal outcomes and impact assessment was published in Autumn 2020 and the significant findings are included in the 2019/20 Impact Report. Overall, the findings of the evaluation were encouraging and helped us identify areas of improvement and revise our theory of change.
The assessment was externally audited and drew the following comments by Southwark Community:
“The report evaluation produced by PoC is thorough and of a high quality. The findings are evidenced and the recommendations are reasonable and appropriate. There is a clear desire for excellence.”
We have since evolved to the provision of a more holistic and practical assistance framework to deliver support tailored and specific to each beneficiary’s needs. In 2020 our research focused on the Covid-19 pandemic. Our survey indicated that prisoners of conscience are disproportionately affected by the pandemic. Eighty percent of the respondents reported being in extreme need of the absolute basics of life – food, shelter, heating, medicines and clothing, with requests for PoC to step in with support.
PoC responded with repeat grants to many prisoners of conscience who had been severely affected by the pandemic. We also adjusted our application process to reflect the new covid reality, encouraging beneficiaries to apply to us direct rather than through a referral agency. With many partners and referral agencies suspending their services, beneficiaries were finding it hard to apply to PoC for support and a quarter of the application we received were directly from individuals.