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Publication of Annual Report for 2020

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Survivor Alliance Publishes it’s Strategic Plan for 2021-2023

”At the beginning of 2020, Survivor Alliance began its journey of Strategic Planning. After 2 years, the organisation was fully functioning, with Staff and Board Members, on-going programming for Survivor Members, a demand for services, and the need to determine direction.

The process yielded the following Strategic Priorities that will guide Survivor Alliance into 2023:

1. Survivor Alliance will strengthen the internal structure and operations of the organization to support on-going growth and long term sustainability.

2. Survivor Alliance will continue to intentionally and strategically grow its Global Membership, aiming to reach 400 survivor members by 2023, while also maintaining focus on deepening member engagement.

3. Survivor Alliance will concretize and expand its trainings and education based offerings to become one of the leading spaces known for Survivor Leadership and Advancement.

4. Survivor Alliance will continue to provide consultation support for external partners around how to respectifully and fully integrate survivors into their spaces with the goal of transforming the Field within 3 years, then move into having survivor members lead this work and/or phasing it out depending on need.

5. Survivor Alliance will continue to grow the number of Survivor Leaders that can fill consultancy positions and provide them with ongoing leadership development support.

6. Survivor Alliance will develop comprehensive fundraising and communications strategies and accompanying tools to support the strategic vision.

7. Survivor Alliance will explore its role around Survivor connection, coordination, and support of mental health needs.”

You can read the full report here.

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Survivor Alliance publishes “Owning Our Own Words”

Owning Our Words was developed to share the creative voices of Survivor Alliance Members. First released in honour of Anti-Slavery Week in October 2020, this publication shares letters, poetry, and artwork of some of our members.

You can purchase a digital copy of Owning Our Words from the store on our website, a $10 donation is suggested.

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Survivor Alliance hosts Anti-Slavery Week Panel & Publication Release: The Untold Story of Survivorship

”Survivor voice and active participation has the potential to transform and enrich the anti-trafficking field. It is important for allies to hear and understand the varying perspectives of survivors in order to work towards collaborative improvements in how services are delivered.

These perspectives are more than just trauma stories – survivors have insight into wider issues which influence their present and future situations, not just their past. This event will be an opportunity for survivors to speak out about issues that contribute to shaping their current and future lives.

This survivor-designed and -delivered interview panel will introduce survivor perspectives, current priorities and future recommendations, in survivors’ own words.”

”Breaking the narrative that is often portrayed of survivors in the media, this year’s Anti-Slavery Week will focus on survivors lives after exploitation, instead of the traumatic details of the exploitation itself. If you are looking for sensationalist stories about what happens in modern slavery, you will NOT find it here.

The week includes Allies Trainings, General Informational Sessions, a discussion about LGBTQ+ rights in anti-trafficking, and training for case workers and mental health professionals, and our flagship event on Anti-Slavery Day, The Untold Story of Survivorship: A Panel & Publication Release.”

As part of this event, we also published “Conversations of Empowerment” & “Owning Our Words” both of which can be downloaded from our store for a suggested donation of $10 each.

Visit the Survivor Alliance Store

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First Employment Pathway workshop with Freedom Fund

Designed with input from survivors based in the UK, this program enacted a strategic approach to combatting slavery and human trafficking, offering survivors a gateway into the anti-slavery field and non-profit sector. The program also allowed survivors to step towards full freedom by providing meaningful employment and financial stability.

This pilot program kicked off with the Freedom Fund opening two part-time positions in their London office. This year-long program was designed specifically for people with lived experience of slavery and human trafficking. The two positions available were Strategic Partnerships Fellow and Program Fellow. Fellows worked closely with their supervisor’s team within the Freedom Fund and developed entry-level skills required for working in non-profit organisations.

The program offered a continuum of support, providing fellows with mentoring from Survivor Alliance during the entire fellowship and during the exit and transition phases. The Fellows could also choose to have a professional mentor to support their development throughout the program. Freedom Fund and Survivor Alliance staff had regular meetings to ensure reciprocal feedback for ongoing improvement of the program.

This pilot aimed to trail and evaluate an employment program that was designed by survivors and allies, for survivors and allies. Keeping in mind the unique needs and interests of survivors seeking employment, and the objectives and performance needs of employers, the Employment Pathways Program provided a new model for both survivor inclusion initiatives and broader diversity and inclusion initiatives.

“We hope that this is just the beginning for sustainable employment for survivors in the anti-slavery movement and beyond,” said Minh Dang, Executive Director of Survivor Alliance. “We also want to give a huge thanks to Amy Rahe, now Freedom Fund’s Director of North America, for all her work on the program design before she departed.”

“We’re committed to centring survivors in the anti-slavery movement,” said Audrey Guichon, Director of Programs at the Freedom Fund. “We are delighted to create opportunities for survivors within our work.”


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Minh joins The Anti-Slavery Collective In Conversation

As part of their #workingfromhome series, our Executive Director Minh Dang was interviewed by HRH Princess Eugenie of York and Julia de Boinville, co-founders of The Anti-Slavery Collective.

This discussion focused on the essential need to involve survivors as experts in the anti-trafficking movement, as well as the need for wellbeing & community for survivors in post-enslavement. Survivor Alliance has sought to build this network & community of survivor leaders since its foundation in 2018.

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Survivor Alliance begins Strategic Planning for 2021-23

The process was led by Kaajal Shah, of K Shah Consulting, LLC. Beginning in May 2020, an internal Strategic Planning Committee was developed composed of Staff and Board Members. The 7 month process included a thorough Environmental Scan of various stakeholders, a summary of findings to support the goal setting retreat with all Staff and Board Members.

Read more about our Strategic Plan here!

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Survivor Alliance turns 2!

Survivor Alliance moved online to celebrate our Birthday via Zoom (instead of the planned in-person The Great Birthday Bake Off, which had to be cancelled).

The online event involved a presentation sharing successes from the year followed by a members-only talent show.”

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US Capacity Building Initiative (CBI) Cohort 2 Launches

Just after we launched this second cohort of CBI in the US, the COVID-19 pandemic hit the US. This was a profoundly challenging time to keep running essential programs and forced us to adapt quickly to still meet & support the needs of survivor communities.

The CBI filled a gap in survivor leadership, where survivors could gather, organize and sustain their involvement in anti-trafficking efforts. CBI USA ran across 3 US cities: Atlanta, Chicago and Minneapolis.

This program was funded by the Pathways To Freedom Grant, supported by Humanity United and NoVo Foundation.
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The USA & the UK enters a lockdown in response to the developing COVID-19 Pandemic.

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Lived Experience Expert Group (LEEG) Kenya

Working with Sophie Otiende, now CEO at GFEMS the LEEG Kenya workshop met to review Walk Free’s Assessment Framework (an assessment of country-wide responses to tackle modern slavery). The Kenya LEEG highlighted the importance of monitoring recruitment agencies, which was then added to Walk Free’s framework for all countries.

After this LEEG, the work of Azadi Kenya became more formalized.

You can read more about LEEGs here.

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Lived Experience Expert Group (LEEG) Ghana

For Ghana LEEG, we worked with Challenging Heights in Ghana, which was founded by James Kofi Annan, renowned survivor leader.

You can read more about LEEGs here.

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2019 Annual Report is published

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Lived Experience Expert Group (LEEG) India

For LEEG India we worked with UTTHAN Leaders Collective and Sanjog, but survivors were invited from several other states in India too.

Some of the Survivor Leaders who took part in the workshop shared their reasons for participating & what they wanted out of the discussion:

”I know the government makes reports without the input of the voices of Survivor Leaders and Survivor Leaders are not asked about their voices, so I am here today to change that” - LEEG India Participant.

”We realize if we are alone we won’t be able to do anything. I came to meet other leaders and to raise our voices together.” - LEEG India Participant

Read more about LEEGs here

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Journey of our UK Survivor Network Publication

One of our first publications as an organisation which tells the story of our UK Survivors Network, their experiences with identification, the home office & national referral mechanism (NRM), challenges of service provision, becoming involved with Survivor Alliance & ways of thriving as a survivor.

”They [Survivor Alliance] have equipped and encouraged me, and have helped me to understand that my life experience is not for organisations to make profit on, or for story-telling to satisfy people’s nosiness. Rather, Survivor Alliance has opened my eyes to see that my life experience is my expertise. I alone can choose when, where, and how to share it.” - UK Member, quoted in Journey of our UK Survivor Network.

This publication was shared at our first Allies Training with colleagues from the anti-trafficking sector as well as the Home Office.

You can purchase a digital copy of this publication from our store for a suggested donation of $5.

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”Beyond Helping: Empowering Survivors of Modern Slavery” The First In-Person Allies Training happens in Nottingham

This session was delivered to a number of colleagues across the anti-trafficking sector, including: Uni of Nottingham’s Rights Lab, West Midlands Anti-Slavery Network, Nottingham Refugee Forum, Freedom Fund, Justice and Care, Hope for Justice, Anti-Slavery International, The Snowdrop Project, Lloyd’s Bank, Sainsburys and the Home Office.

The allies training focused on shifting perspectives from helping and providing direct services to survivors, to working with survivors as colleagues and subject matter experts.

Allies Training Overview:

The importance of survivor inclusion for the anti-trafficking sector.

The ally continuum and allyship in the anti-trafficking sector.

The basics of trauma literacy in relation to working with survivors.

Identifying concrete action steps to take to include survivors in your work.

The training also provided participants with access to our Allies Toolkit and pre-/post-training surveys that assess the readiness of an organisation to work with survivors as colleagues.

Alex Norris MP for Nottingham North supported this event with University of Nottingham, Rights Lab.

You can read more about our allies training here.

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”What it’s really like: Survivors of Slavery Speak Out!” event in Nottingham

Greater Nottingham Modern Slavery Forum and Anti-Slavery International invited members of the public to this Anti-Slavery Day event.

Three Survivor Leaders sat on a panel, where they shared their experiences of life post-slavery within the UK, alongside their opinions concerning what could be done better, and how people could get involved by supporting survivors in their community!

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UK Pilot of Capacity Building Initiative (CBI) kicks off

This pilot supported Survivor Leaders to develop & implement UK chapters of Survivor Alliance.”

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Initial workshop with Freedom Fund to create Employment Pathways Fellowship Program

The purpose of the workshop was to begin to co-design one potential program to provide employment for survivors of human trafficking.

7 Freedom Fund staff, 3 Survivor Alliance staff, and 5 survivor leaders spent a day discussing key components of a fellowship that will enable survivors to learn the skills necessary for entry level jobs at anti-slavery organizations.”

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Our Nottingham Chapter has it’s first meeting

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1-Year Anniversary Event in Nottingham

To celebrate our first year of operation, staff, members & allies met in a Nottingham cafe for a Card Making Drive, writing & creating birthday cards for our then over 100 members.

These cards were then sent out to each member on their birthday.


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Freedom United protest outside Parliament.

”Wide coalition of organisations to march and hand in a petition supported by 60,000 to protect victims of modern slavery in the UK.

On Thursday 14 March a wide coalition of organisations formed by Anti-Slavery International, Freedom United, Co-op, Global Citizen, Care UK joined by members of Survivor Alliance, will deliver a petition asking the UK Government to back the Modern Slavery (Victim Support) Bill.



Over 60,000 members of the public took action to support the Bill, ranging from petitioning the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary, to emailing and sending social media message to their MPs.

Campaigners will start their action by handing a petition to the Home Office and then march through London to hand in the petition at Number 10.

Nancy delivers position papers & petition advocating for the Victims Care Bill to be passed to 10 Downing Street.

The Modern Slavery (Victim Support) Bill, sponsored by Lord McColl of Dulwich and Iain Duncan Smith, would guarantee that all victims of slavery in England and Wales would receive comprehensive support including accommodation, counselling, healthcare and legal aid for at least 12 months, instead of the current 45 days.

It would also guarantee an immigration status of the victims for the first 12 month to ensure the victims can focus on recover and rebuilding their lives free from worrying about the threat of deportation, often back to countries which wouldn’t guarantee their protection from their traffickers.



Currently, the Government only guarantees 45 days of support for the potential victims whilst their cases are reviewed by the Home Office to decide whether they are deemed to have been a victim of slavery, although the Government is planning to extend that to 90 days. After the decision is made, there is no guaranteed support for the victims, and many struggle to make ends meet, some becoming homeless as a result.

The support for the victims is often inadequate, and many victims are forced to embark on legal battles to regulate their immigrations status, often leaving them unable to work legally or claim benefits to support their basic needs.”
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Survivor Alliance Bradford Chapter has it’s first meeting

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501c3 Documentation Received - Survivor Alliance is registered as a non-profit in the US

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Survivor Alliance Publishes it’s first Annual Report

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Visit to UTTHAN Leaders’ Collective in Kolkata.

UTTHAN is a survivor leaders collective based in Kolkata, India. They were the first collective to join Survivor Alliance, even though each UTTHAN member joined as an individual. Our ED visited to learn about how their collective works, share about Survivor Alliance’s work, and brainstorm avenues of colloboration. This trip helped build a strong relationship between SA and UTTHAN.

Read more about UTTHAN Leaders’ Collective

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Lakeside Arts Freedom After Slavery Event

Synopsis - “What do shoeboxes, a diamond ring, and Kentucky Fried Chicken have in common? For one survivor of slavery, they are all reminders of her enslavement. Typically, we learn about the horrors of slavery through gory details and images. This talk will give you an inside look at how slavery impacts the seemingly mundane, everyday aspects of a person’s life.”

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“”By doing research on survivor-led initiatives when I was a student at the University of York, UK”

- Anonymous”

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Behind the Scenes: Leaders Transforming the Narrative about Survivors of Slavery
Shamere McKenzie & Minh Dang

Event synopsis: “Survivors of slavery live among us, not just as former slaves but as key anti-slavery leaders. In this talk, you will hear a conversation between two anti-slavery leaders who are defying the norms and changing the narrative about survivors of slavery. They will speak about their work to empower survivors, and give you a backstage pass to the conversations that survivor leaders have about their role in the anti-slavery movement.
Shamere McKenzie is CEO of SunGate Foundation and Minh Dang is Executive Director of Survivor Alliance and a PhD student at the University of Nottingham.”

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“ “I feel like I’ve known Survivor Alliance for a long time! Minh provided an essay for the 2018 Global Slavery Index entitled, ‘Survivors are speaking. Are we listening?’ while we first collaborated on a project, running our first Lived Experience Expert Group in the UK in October 2018. I’ve been aware of Survivor Alliance and Minh’s work for a lot longer than that!”

- Katharine Bryant, Walk Free”

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The First Lived Experience Expert Group (LEEG) Workshop was Facilitated in the UK.

Their focus was to review WALK FREE’s Global Slavery Index. Survivors shared what they thought was missing from the conceptual framework, what they think should be changed and discussed the discrepancies between what government say they’re doing versus the lived experience of it.

Read more about LEEGs here

Read more about WALK FREE’s Global Slavery Index here

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CBI (Capacity Building Initiative) USA, Survivor Alliance’s first program, is formed.

This program filled a gap in survivor leadership, where survivors could gather, organize and sustain their involvement in anti-trafficking efforts. CBI USA ran across 3 US cities: Atlanta, Chicago and Minneapolis.

This program was funded by the Pathways To Freedom Grant, supported by Humanity United and NoVo Foundation.

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“ “I first engaged with Survivor Alliance when I met Minh Dang at the Rights Lab.”

- Amelia Watkins-Smith, PhD Student & Ally”

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The Modern Day Slavery and Survivors Voices Conference with Nottingham Rights Lab & Nottingham Business School.

The Maasai Cricket Warriors visit from Kenya to run a workshop for to learn more about ending FGM, forced marriage and modern slavery.



The day ended with a game of cricket!

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“ “Meeting with other Survivors. And participated actively in every programs and contributed to polishing SA to do something unique in Anti Slavery movement and empowering them globally.”

- Manoj Guran, Human rights Activist & Anti Trafficking Specialist (Freelance)”

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Survivor Alliance gets a logo!

Beautifully designed by our friends at Mojatu Foundation.
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Survivor Alliance UK C.I.C is incorporated with Companies House!

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Survivor Alliance Launches on Twitter!

”...So we decided April 23rd that we were going to launch. It was a Twitter chat... basically you get people online at the same time, and it was two things that day: we released membership enrolment so people could sign up and then we were online on Twitter at a certain time so that people could ask us questions like: What is Survivor Alliance about? What does it mean to join? What can you do? ...Our Membership Coordinator was on her own personal account and I was on our organisation account and my personal account, so I was like asking myself questions... At one point we were in her kitchen in Nottingham ...and it was just so funny also talking to each other whilst writing to ourselves and cracking up because it was just like ‘oh Minh what do you think?’ That was it. No big event.”

Launching today, we unite & empower survivors of human trafficking & slavery around the world. Survivors can enrol! https://t.co/K38y6biiOS and join us @ 12pm for a twitter chat! @Freedom_Fund @rightsbeacon @minhspeakstruth #survivorempowerment #SurvivorAlliance #EndSlavery

— Survivor Alliance (@empwrsurvivors) April 23, 2018

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The Freedom Fund become Survivor Alliance’s fiscal sponsor

Enabling Survivor Alliance to begin its journey as a non-profit.

Read more about The Freedom Fund

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Minh presents at University of Nottingham’s Right’s Lab Event:

”Collaborating for Freedom: Anti-Slavery Partnerships in the UK.”

Multi-agency partnership working is often highlighted as an essential aspect of the UK public policy response to modern slavery. The Home Office’s (2014) Modern Slavery Strategy emphasises that effective partnership work is ‘crucial’ and must include ‘greater awareness among frontline professionals, coordinated international activity, close working with the private sector and support from communities, including civil society and faith groups’.

However, despite the priority placed on partnerships by the UK Government, there has been little guidance to date on the form they should take, or how they might best identify and deliver shared goals and responsibilities. In the majority of cases there has also been no dedicated funding to facilitate partnership activity, and no means of monitoring what activity is in place. This means that until now, relatively little has been understood about the different partnership responses to Modern Slavery that are emerging across the UK.

This research report is part of a collaborative project between the Office of the Independent AntiSlavery Commissioner (IASC) and the University of Nottingham. The aim of the work was to map multi-agency anti-slavery partnerships across the UK, identify potential examples of ‘good practice’ among them and understand the conditions that helped to facilitate success.

Read the Report Here

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Formal conversations between University of Nottingham’s Rights Lab & Survivor Alliance Begin

Find out more about Rights Lab here.

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Survivor Alliance’s mission statement is finalised

”Uniting and empowering survivors of slavery and trafficking to be leaders of the anti-slavery movement.”
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The first concept note about Survivor Alliance is submitted to potential funders.

”Every successful social movement has required the voices of those whose lives are deeply affected by injustice. For centuries, victims of violence have successfully led the development of effective policies and interventions. The Survivor Alliance will provide one key solution that is currently missing: a survivor-driven institution to organize and champion the voices of survivors of human trafficking and slavery.

Currently, survivor leaders rely on invitations from media, non-profits, government agencies, and universities, to have our voices heard. We have called on these same institutions to support and elevate our voices. Now, a new strategy is needed. We want to build a resilient survivor movement that sustains the advocacy whims, and that is proactive in sharing our expertise, rather than reactive to the requests for our input.

In order to organize survivor voices, survivors must be the lead organizers. ”

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An organisation name is decided: Survivor Alliance.

(Alternative ideas included Survivor Coalition!)
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First discussions are had about starting “The Survivor Alliance”.

“The first time the idea of Survivor Alliance entered into my head was after an advisory group. There were a handful of US survivor leaders advising an organization on their survivor inclusion work and we were disappointed that they were just asking advice their organization. On the one hand we understood, but on the other hand, we were wanting them, a major organization, to help us push for wider change and wider engagement with survivors.

I also saw that it was limited for us to basically ask to be included. Some of us had a follow up meeting and talked about this idea that we need to have our own space to define the priorities.” ”