100 Resilient Cities is a program pioneered by the Rockefeller Foundation to help cities around the world become more resilient to the physical, social and economic challenges that face the world today.
Toronto is one of the fastest growing and most diverse cities in the world. But like other global cities, Toronto's success is paired with significant challenges.
To combat these challenges the City of Toronto, in partnership with 100 Resilient Cities, is creating a Resilience Strategy to ensure Toronto is inclusive, livable, and prosperous for many years to come.
We wanted to engage the citizens of Toronto to let them know that a strategy was being created, but to also get them involved in the participation of the development of the strategy.
Looking to engage Torontonians and build awareness for the Resilient Strategy, we decided to make a short film that focuses on lived experience. The film would be used as a tool to capture people's attention and open up a dialog on how to build a more resilient Toronto.
This eight-minute film features the story of Miranda Kamal, the owner of a non-profit boxing gym for at risk kids in the priority neighbourhood of South Parkdale. In the gym the kids can be themselves and learn discipline while having fun. It is a real life look at what it means to be resilient.
The film was used both in its full-length format as well as a trailer format. It was played at conferences, city meetings, workshops, film festivals, screened online, and played in public city spaces like the subway platform.
Torontonians started to hear about the newly forming Resilient Strategy and went online to find out more information.
Overtime a collective awareness started to grow as more and more people found out about the Resilient Strategy. The Resilient Toronto website received a 10x increase in traffic and a 13x increase in applications to their micro grant program.
Perhaps most importantly, the film helped further the conversation in Toronto around resilience and helped bring awareness real life challenges.
The Resilience Toronto program continues to build their strategy with help from key community partners and the film continues to be screened at select community events.
