Active until 1980, Challenge for Change used film and video production to illuminate the social concerns of various communities within Canada, with funding from eight different departments of the Canadian government.
"[2] Stewart, quoting Jones (1981) states "the Challenge for Change films would convey messages from 'the people' (particularly disadvantaged groups) to the government, directly or through the Canadian public.
[1][6][7] Started by John Kemeny, Colin Low, Fernand Dansereau and Robert Forget, and later run by George C. Stoney, the Challenge for Change program was designed to give voice to the "voiceless.
[11] It is the focus of a collection of essays and archival documents edited by Thomas Waugh, Michael Brendan Baker, and Ezra Winton, Challenge for Change: Activist Documentary at the National Film Board of Canada (McGill-Queen's University Press, 2010).
In 1967, with Challenge for Change already underway, Snowden discussed his ideas with Low and introduced him to the university's Fogo Island field officer Fred Earle.
"[13] In the films, Fogo Islanders identified a number of key issues: the inability to organize, the need for communication, the resentment felt towards resettlement and the anger that the government seemed to be making decisions about their future with no consultation.
Low decided to show the films to the people of Fogo and thirty-five separate screenings were held with the total number of viewers reaching 3,000.
"[3] The second set of trainees[3] included: The unit's first release was The Ballad of Crowfoot (1968), described as "the first NFB film to present First Nations experience from an Indigenous point of view.
The series laid the foundation for the launch of the National Film Board's women's unit, known colloquially as Studio D. Shannon was the founder and first Executive Producer.
VTR St-Jacques, directed by Bonnie Sherr Klein, chronicles the efforts of Dorothy Todd Hénaut as she trains community members in video production as they organize themselves to fight the city of Montreal for affordable and accessible medical care.
[27] In 2007, the NFB launched Filmmaker-in-Residence a cross-media project based on the Challenge for Change model, with frontline health care workers, in partnership with St. Michael's Hospital, Toronto.