Winky Skevington (Lee, DH 1994) left Downe House in 1994. In her year off she travelled to the remote village of Kiminini, Kenya, where her experiences as a teacher revealed the transformative power of education. After completing a BEd, she spent over 20 years teaching internationally, specialising in Special Educational Needs and Autism, and teaching in many challenging environments. Winky's long-held ambition to advance education in East Africa and improve lives never faded. After an introduction to Will Travers OBE, who had a similar interest in the development of rural communities in Kenya, the groundwork for The Hummingbird Initiative began. Winky set up and now runs the organisation which has been operating for the last 7 years, whilst also bringing up her two energetic boys.

Rhoda Phillips’ career is rooted in conservation, community development and organisational change. Her commitment to conservation began in 2001, when she became Manager and Education Officer of Danjugan Island for the Philippine Reef and Rainforest Conservation Foundation, Inc. She now serves as a Trustee on their board. Rhoda set up Communities for Nature, a charity that connects communities on the front line of conservation with corporate partners, supporting community-led, hands-on conservation and sustainable development projects around the world. Alongside her charity work, Rhoda works in Emerging Technology and Innovation at The Crown Estate.

Winky and Rhoda first met at a Downe House event at the House of Lords in 2025 when Winky was awarded an Alumnae Achievement Award. They are now working together with Rhoda’s Green Spark Fund supporting Winky’s conservation projects in Kenya.

Finding Purpose

Winky’s journey began during her year off. Raised in a comfortable environment, she remembers travelling to Africa to volunteer. She took off her watch and never put it back on. Time stopped mattering. Yet she knew her time in Kiminini had changed her forever, “it just left such a lasting impact.”

She nurtured an embryonic desire to make a difference. Returning home she carried on with life – but something had shifted. On her 36th birthday, she realised it was now or never, so she rolled up her sleeves and made a start.

Rhoda describes herself as “a restless soul.” After working as an island manager in nature tourism, something awakened in her – a deep connection to ecology and community. Living close to nature, “you know every single fish, every single coral, every single tree, and you fall in love.” And once you fall in love with nature, you want to protect it.

From desert islands to urban jungles, both women had experienced a profound change of heart. They saw models that worked – and asked: How do we scale this up?

Tackling Poverty Through Education

Poverty is complex. It is not solved by a single well, a single scholarship or a single donation. It’s shaped by water, health, sanitation, education, environment and opportunity – all of which are deeply interconnected. And lasting change only happens when communities are at the centre of the solution. Winky and Rhoda put these insights into action in the work of their respective charities.

“Without engagement it’s going to fail. People need to understand the why, and people need to own something and be part of it. That's the ingredient for success.” Rhoda

They have both seen what happens when there isn’t a sense of ownership. Winky remembered a container of water equipment arriving in a village with no community engagement. No one knew what to do with it. It sat idle and remained unused. Even if there’s a clean water source, families will continue collecting water from a dirty river that’s closer because it’s more convenient. The issue isn’t infrastructure, it’s education. Behaviour doesn’t change without understanding why it matters.

The Complexity of Poverty

Winky knows that water is never just water.

When Winky first met Blessed, each day she spent hours collecting water – a task that kept her out of the classroom and exposed her to waterborne diseases. Connecting her home to a sustainable borehole changed everything. With a reliable water source, the household could grow more than rain-fed crops, raise animals and increase their income. It also gave Blessed the time to attend school and pursue an education.

Sanitation tells a similar story.

Across seven partner schools serving 19 villages, there were no proper toilets – only long-drop pits in metal boxes, swarming with flies and disease. With no privacy and no sanitary products, for girls, this could mean missing school during their periods – and often dropping out entirely. Early motherhood followed. And opportunities vanished.

Simply building safe toilets and connecting schools to clean water and electricity has proven transformative. As Winky notes, “building loos in schools, even though it's not glamorous, it's getting girls into school and changing their entire trajectory of life.”

The schools now run sustainable feeding programmes, growing their own vegetables with the help of reliable water access. In communities where malnutrition and stunted growth are widespread – and where some children receive only one meal a day, at school – these programmes are critical. School enrolment has surged as families recognise that education now also brings nourishment and opportunity.

Water irrigates crops. Crops improve nutrition. Nutrition improves learning. Education opens opportunity. It’s an ecosystem.

Protecting Nature Without Destroying Livelihoods

In coastal communities, conservation can create tensions. When a protected marine area was established to preserve coral reefs, local fishermen feared losing their livelihoods. Rhoda reflected on how she could change hearts and minds when protecting the environment appears to take food off the table.

The answer lies in integration.

Planting trees isn’t enough if they are just cut down for firewood. Conservation only works when communities understand why ecosystems matter – and why they themselves will benefit from protecting them. As Rhoda emphasises, “Communities are not part of the solution. They are the solution.”

Without education and engagement forests will be cut down, coral reefs will be overfished and projects will fail. With education and engagement, something powerful happens.

In a coastal village, Rhoda supports sustainable livelihoods that reduce pressure on marine protected areas. She began by training men and women in crafts and jewellery-making, to provide an alternative income. Over time, confidence and incomes grew.

Today, the village combines sustainable fishing, crafts and tourism with environmental initiatives such as mangrove reforestation. A small input created a multiplier effect. With targeted funding and mentoring, local communities can lead their own change. “We put our resources where they really matter,” Rhoda says.

Sometimes it’s a borehole. Sometimes it’s a toilet block. Sometimes it’s a scholarship. But it’s always about dignity.

Rethinking Corporate Giving

In London, many companies donate to large international charities. But increasingly, corporates want more than a logo on a report. They want connection. They want to understand where their money goes and the impact it has. They have money, but they don’t necessarily know how to make a difference. That’s where partnership becomes powerful.

Rather than imposing answers, both Winky and Rhoda curate relationships between businesses and grassroots projects. Both sides learn. Corporates bring their resources and expertise; communities bring their lived knowledge and local leadership.

Everything begins on the ground. Communities always contribute – financially or through labour, land or leadership. And this ownership really matters. Winky stresses, “Everything we do comes from the community.”

Backing Local Changemakers

Jan’s story stays with Rhoda. Bright and ambitious, Jan saw his future disappear when his father died. With fishing incomes declining and no one left to support the household, hope was fading.

But a Communities for Nature scholarship allowed him to enrol on a fisheries degree. Four years later, he is graduating, and his life trajectory has changed. Not only can he now support his family, but he has also become a source of inspiration in his village, showing other young people that opportunity is possible.

Many communities have bright ideas but no access to funding. Through the Green Spring Fund, Rhoda identifies grassroots leaders, offers them seed funding and the confidence to get started. Seven projects have been kickstarted in this way. Five have already scaled into larger, long-term initiatives.

The Reality Day-to-Day

Winky and Rhoda are fundraisers, strategists, communicators, project managers – jacks of all trades.

There’s no typical day. Early morning calls with charity partners are combined with school runs, strategy meetings, writing policies, managing accounts, pitching to funders, creating content for social media and writing impact reports.

Funding remains one of the hardest challenges. The first grant is always the toughest to land. They find support from FinTech and other corporates, high-net-worth individuals, schools hosting book drives and students organising walks or other forms of fundraising.

Pushing for multi-year commitments, rather than one-off donations, creates longevity. But Winky advises “Don’t say no to anything,” every pound matters. If everyone gave just £1, the impact would be extraordinary.

Both Rhoda and Winky manage their charitable work remotely from their homes in London and Mallorca. But travel to their projects on the ground, spending time in communities they love, always reignites their purpose.

The Lessons They’ve Learned

It takes passion, dedication and commitment to follow in Winky and Rhoda’s footsteps – “It becomes your everything,” says Rhoda. But tapping into networks of like-minded people who share your vision is key. And the rewards make it more than worthwhile.

For Winky, the journey has reshaped what she believes she’s capable of achieving – meaningful change is possible when you trust your vision and act boldly. But if she were starting again, she’d approach it more like a business from the start – designing systems, governance and policies. Passion drives the mission, but rigour sustains it.

Rhoda’s advice is to build a diverse team – find people who challenge you, bring different skills and will hold you accountable. Her strategic approach has also evolved. Early on she concentrated on chasing results and scaling fast. But now she’s laser focused on pursuing long-term impact and transformative change. Above all, whatever is built always leaves people and communities stronger than before.

Progress can take time. In communities where change unfolds over years, it can sometimes feel painfully gradual, compared to the speed of the developed world. Rainfall patterns shift; climate pressures grow; corruption complicates progress. But step by step, things move forward.

They sometimes forget to look up and see what has been built: water on-tap, sanitation installed, libraries launched, schools equipped, scholarships awarded and livelihoods restored.

The Bigger Picture

Ending poverty is not simple. Change doesn’t come from dropping solutions into communities. It’s not linear. It requires water, sanitation, education, economic opportunity, environmental protection and – above all – walking alongside the people and communities involved.

When communities thrive, ecosystems recover. When girls stay in school, futures expand. When livelihoods grow, forests stand. And when hearts and minds change, everything is possible.

Of course, as Winky says, “There’s always more to do.”

Find out more at:

thehummingbirdinitiative.org

communitiesfornature.org