Chat Analógico - Postal Communication

Chat Analógico® is a project within the social entrepreneurship sphere.This initiative addresses the scarce intergenerational communication problem, that has been occuring/devel...

Chat Analógico® is a project within the social entrepreneurship sphere.

This initiative addresses the scarce intergenerational communication problem, that has been occuring/developing.

Chat Analógico® is a service that enables communication between generations.

The process is based on two key-players: gathering correspondent groups in primary schools and nurcery homes that will chat through postcards along the school year and, obviously, postal communication.

It All begins with a Chat Analógico® Kit, in which are provided all the tools needed to iniate the process: it includes up to 2000 postcards for one school, 50 identifying pins, an instructions manual and a slide presentation for the initial workshop that starts the communication process. Each Kit serves a maximum of 50 people – 25 students + 25 seniors – and the retail price is 250€.

We’ve also developed a smaller Kit that enables each pair of correspondents to communicate from their homes and even takes the project to many more people. It consists in 20 postcards, 20 postal services’ stamps and its retail price is 25€.

The prototype tested in the field with real people engaged a total of five experts, teachers and psychologists; 130 correspondents, who exchanged about 800 postcards, correspondents’ relatives; institutions’ boards, among other social partners.

Chat Analógico® showed us that is possible to bring generations closer and promoted seniors’ inclusion in community’s active cores, classic writing and Reading practice, empathy and personal and social skills development, and reinvigorated the Portuguese language and postal communication.

About the author

Samuel Moura Lemos and Daniela Gapo (we’re Chat Analógico®’s team), our academic training has been focused in Design since high-school. In college, we decided to graduate in Product Design, but the last year of graduation brought us the Action For Age project and we were infected with what social entrepreneurs designate as the "bug": this overwhelming urge to change the world.

Since then, we have been attending trainings, workshops and conferences in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship. The most recent of which was the IES’ Social Entrepreneurs Bootcamp. This Bootcamp was the milestone in our journey, either as designers, as social entrepreneurs. It made our vision and Chat Analógico®’s mission clearer in terms of focus on the social problem we address as well as the project’s dissemination and growth strategies.

Looking back, we find our journey to be a great start, but, if we’re going to change the world, we need many more people inpired and chating through postcards!

Budget and due dates

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