Save the Children is not about to start changing its name, the aid charity’s chief executive has said.
Gemma Sherrington, the charity’s director of fundraising and marketing, told delegates at Third Sector’s annual Fundraising Conference in June that Save was having “a very live conversation” about its name at a time when the aid sector was trying to move away from white saviour narratives.
But speaking to Third Sector in a wide-ranging interview published today, Gwen Hines said the conversation would not lead to a name change, although it would lead to a shift in communications from the charity.
“We’re not about to start changing the name but I think what you will see in the branding and communications is a very different image,” she said.
“We’re stepping away from what’s been called poverty porn because we’re not in the business of doing that, we’re trying to give children a voice and show children as a positive role model for themselves, for each other.”
But she said the conversation was an important one for the charity to have.
“We have very deliberately shifted, internally as well as externally, to say: ‘We’re not here to save children, they’re not some passive thing that needs saving, whether they’re in Malawi or Scotland, they don’t just sit there waiting for us to come along and save them,’” she said.
“Our approach is about making children agents of their own change, putting them at the centre, helping them get their rights and flipping around that way of thinking.”
She pointed out that the 102-year-old same was used by more than 25 of Save the Children International’s member organisations around the world.
Hines, who was previously the charity’s executive director of global programmes, was appointed in July.
The full interview with Hines and Tsitsi Chawatama, the charity’s chair, can be found here.