Force For Good

About Us

community of guardians

Members: Membership in the CoG’s is open to all citizens of the world who have access to a device that can access the platform. In support of Individual members, there will be Verified Scientists or Knowledge Experts who will guide and share lessons on providing best practices and suggestions for group action.

The importance of including a strong knowledge base is important as it gives a voice to Scientists and other Knowledge Experts who have spent much of their lives studying the subjects that can help solve the problems we aim to tackle. The CoG’s platform will give them a voice to share their knowledge and educate an interested audience who is eager to find tangible ways to tackle big problems. Alongside Individual members and Knowledge Experts, the Cog’s have a third actor the Verified Ambassador, whose job is to champion a cause and share their celebrity status with Science in pursuit of a noble goal. Each SDG group can have as many Ambassadors and Knowledge experts who choose to join that particular SDG group to address that particular SDG. Each of these members will need to be verified by the CoG’s before they can be viewed as this type of member.

Note: Individuals who may also be known as knowledge experts or ambassadors are also welcome to join as an individual member but to be labelled on the platform or to serve in a “Knowledge Expert” or “Ambassador” role one must be verified and confirmed. This is an important step to ensure the legitimacy of the site and ensure members are being guided and championed by legitimate actors.

Individual Members: The majority of members will be classified as “individual members”. Any citizen from any geographical location across the world can join as an individual member. There are no extra verification steps to join as an individual member but each member will be required to agree to the site membership agreement and the code of conduct requirements. The Individual group members can then, after reviewing the various challenges within their SDGs group, accept a Challenge. Once accepted, members can post pictures and questions as they progress and work toward completing the challenge. After completing a challenge, each member will be requested to complete a questionnaire, where information can be collected to monitor success and achieve rewards points.

Knowledge Experts: To join the community as a “Knowledge Expert” the member is requested to verify their identity and educational or work-related experience that justifies their role as a Knowledge Expert. This is an important step as it allows us to ensure that the sources of information being shared with each group are valid and follow scientific rigour. Science is an important means of producing knowledge and getting to what approximates the truth. Good science results from rigorous processes. Part of the rigour in science and knowledge creation is the peer review process, which is a means of ensuring not only the correctness of facts but also transparency. Empirical data used in science that can be verified forms a sound basis for robust discussion, debate and decision-making. Science brings a degree of rationality that creates a higher probability that the best interest of society or the public interest will be taken into account in, for example, decision-making. This enables the SDG groups to be led by Knowledge Experts to participate in decision-making and progressive scientific principles. Knowledge Experts allow science to be disseminated in ways that are understood and are important for building trust. Knowledge Experts will share lessons and facts within the applicable SDG private group areas as well the most important part, “A Challenge”.  The Challenge will be posted exclusively by “knowledge experts” who will then post the challenge after sharing knowledge about the issue as it relates to the SDGs group.

Ambassadors: To join the community as an Ambassador the member is requested to verify their identity and provide information that justifies their role as an Ambassador. This is an important step as Ambassadors will rally the participants and use their fame and visibility to encourage and inspire the group to meet the goals outlined by Knowledge Expert. This verification step is important to ensure the safety and validity of the community. We must ensure that both Ambassadors and Knowledge Experts are who they say they are and that no one is masquerading as someone they are not. This jeopardizes the legitimacy of the whole community and we ask that Ambassadors be supportive of this verification step as we truly value the role of Ambassadors and want to protect our members by knowing that Ambassadors are truly who they say they are. Ambassadors will serve an important role in rallying the group of people who have chosen a particular challenge to accept.  They can positively use their fame to encourage more memberships and can provide moral boosting confidence to the group as it is recognized that these are big challenges we face.

The Challenge: Knowledge Experts will be responsible for posting “Challenges”. The Challenge will be posted exclusively by “knowledge experts” who will then post this challenge after sharing knowledge about the issue as it relates to the SDGs group. The knowledge expert will be given some common guidelines for posting a challenge to ensure challenges are consistent across all groups and measurable. There will also be a “Once a Day” Challenge listed on the main page that users who have not joined an SDGs group yet or those seeking an easy way to quickly contribute and earn reward points can accept. This challenge can be collected from other SDG’s group challenges as a way for users to see what other groups are doing. Challenges can only be issued by Knowledge Experts but each challenge can have as many members, Knowledge Experts or Ambassadors as required, depending on the interest, size and scope of the challenge. Challenges can proceed without Ambassadors and we expect the early challenges as the community grows to have many challenges with only a knowledge expert on board.  We are hoping as the community grows fans will encourage famous ambassadors to join.

Challenge Guidelines: Advice for Knowledge Experts before posting a challenge:

1. Raise awareness through broad group engagement and learning by posting lessons from your area of expertise and how it relates to solving an SDG’s issues, and then connecting the SDGs to the groups interests to inspire and build momentum for change
2. Consult on local priorities to develop a shared vision.
3. Understand your group’s progress to celebrate success and galvanize action
4. Align existing group plans with the Global Goals
5. Develop a group challenge for advancing priority goals, ensuring the challenge has clear steps to complete and are measurable. (see Data collection requirements to officially complete a challenge.
6. Invite diverse voices to participate, offering support to enable participation.
7. Identify meaningful indicators that resonate with your community to measure progress and encourage group members to post their progress on the group and main page to inspire others.
8. Once you are ready to post your Challenge send it to group administrators to approve and to post.