The added value of Social Entrepreneurship in Youth Work Erasmus Project

Project Title

The added value of Social Entrepreneurship in Youth Work

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for youth

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: International cooperation, international relations, development cooperation; Entrepreneurial learning – entrepreneurship education; Youth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy)

Project Summary

“The added value of Social Entrepreneurship in Youth Work” is a 24 months Strategic Partnership – transfer of good practice – under the KA2 of the Erasmus Plus Programme.
The Project aims to create a framework where youth workers can benefit of the experience of successful initiatives of Social Entrepreneurship developed by youth organizations. Thanks to this good experience sharing, the youth workers are going to acquire new methods that will allow them to transfer tools and methodology to stimulate and develop the youth initiative.
The consortium is made of 6 partners including the coordinator – TDM 2000 (Italy). The partners represent:
– Luxembourg – Art square Luxembourg asbl
– France – Coopérative CO-ACTIONS
– Bulgaria – Law and Internet Foundations –LIF
– Estonia – Estonian Social Enterprise Network
– Greece – Institute for Entrepreneurship and Development – IED
Basically all partners met during different events organized by an association of Erasmus Plus National Agencies in the frame of the Towards Collaborative Practice forum on social innovation and entrepreneurship, which started in Malmo – Sweden in 2015.
The experience of the TCP Forums, made the partnership strong and solid with an idea for cooperation that became real with this proposal.
During the TCP Forums, we have met organizations and experts from all over Europe; we have realized how big is the potential that the world of social entrepreneurship has to support the improvement of youth work and vice versa. At the same time we have noticed how still confused is the understanding of “Social Entrepreneurship”, third sector and even of youth work. Listening, observing and reflecting we realized that Social entrepreneurship has become a form of self-employment for many, allowing people to be self-sufficient while making a difference in society at the same time. We understood that in that world we can find answers that the youth sector is searching to continue empowering youth.
Our goal is to inform youth workers about the concept, methods, and values of social entrepreneurship that are suitable to the youth sector, as well as provide youth workers with real model examples of young social entrepreneurs in action.
Our primary target group are youth workers. We are going to involve directly 200 of them. Indirectly we foresee an involvement of other 300 of them through sharing of information and learning acquired during the short-term joint staff activities, and 700 additional representatives of other stakeholders.
Our ultimate target are all youth (especially those with fewer opportunities), that after the project, thanks to proper guidance, mentorship, and preparation on behalf of youth NGOs and youth workers will be stimulated to take action to improve themselves and the society in which they live.
The specific objectives of the project are:
– to give opportunity to youth workers to acquire appropriate knowledge on social entrepreneurship
– to compare the different perceptions of the meaning of social entrepreneurship in Europe and especially in the countries partners of the project referring also to the different legislations in force
– to share good practices of social entrepreneurship methodologies that could be taken as examples and replicated
– to foster the invention of youth initiatives/to stimulate youth initiative among our local youth
In order to reach these objectives we have prepared an activity plan that foresees:
– 4 Transnational Partners Meetings (1 Kick off meeting, 1 between the first mobility and the first group of ,
– 2 short staff mobility events
– 6 short staff mobility visits
– at least 8 visibility dissemination events per partner
During these activities the partners will have the opportunity to meet, compare, plan, monitor, share responsibilities, and re-arrange the plans in order to efficiently reach the set results.
The participants will have the opportunity to better comprehend the meaning of social entrepreneurship, how it is understood and applied in the countries involved in the project and will work to create a document that contains all this information and that can be the example to enlarge the research to the rest of Europe.
Through the activities they will also be able to observe in person how the models work and finally they will work together to elaborate ideas on how to harvest the results of the good practices in terms of social entrepreneurship development and transform them in tools to encourage youth initiatives.
In addition, we will also work on an online virtual working space that will work as a back office for the entire project. Here we will share and discuss also the outputs of the C meetings and their completion. In the case of the short visits, the virtual working space will include one “discussion room” per model.

Project Website

http://socialentrepreneurship-youth.eu

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 118316 Eur

Project Coordinator

TDM 2000 ODV & Country: IT

Project Partners

• Art Square Luxembourg asbl
• CO-ACTIONS
• INSTITUTE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT
• MTÜ Sotsiaalsete Ettevõtete Võrgustik
• PRAVO I INTERNET FOUNDATION