Pandora continues its collaboration with UNICEF, which aims to help reach more than 10 million children and young people with opportunities to learn, express themselves and find work in the future.

As of today, 22% of people aged 15–24 years, globally, are neither in employment, education, or training, 68% of whom are girls and young women. Since 2019, Pandora’s Charms for change initiative has been supporting UNICEF’s work to ensure that every child not only survives but can also thrive – one of the key areas being improving access to quality learning opportunities, including projects using the UPSHIFT approach to support youth and adolescents in becoming confident social entrepreneurs.

Local UNICEF projects see the benefit of the UPSHIFT approach in practice, such as the ‘Dreamcatcher’ programme in Guatemala. The programme helps marginalised youth, including indigenous people and those from rural areas, get back to school and develop the skills they need to pursue their hopes for the future. The students are supported through the secondary education that the programme provides, as well as practical internships.

“Since 2019, Pandora has proudly supported UNICEF’s efforts to empower young people by funding learning and skills development, rights awareness and gender equality activities in several countries around the world ” said Marissa Saretsky, Head of Sustainability at Pandora. “The UNICEF Dreamcatcher program in Guatemala helps to open doors for young boys and girls by bringing students through vital lower secondary education.”

In support of the positive dreams and hopes of children and young people, Pandora has adapted its existing Dreamcatcher charm by adding the colour blue into the design, creating a new limited edition piece. A dreamcatcher is a symbolic talisman originating from Native American and indigenous communities, thought to protect people from bad dreams by only allowing good dreams to pass through.

With 15€ (+-R250) from every purchase of the charm donated to UNICEF, Pandora fans will be making a real difference by helping UNICEF to support vulnerable children and young people, including those from marginalized and indigenous communities, to reach their true potential. The donations will also help fund essentials such as school textbooks to support learning for the next generation.