semcoSocial Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communities

PUBLIC REPORT¬

CENTRO SVILUPPOCREATIVODANILO DOLCI

With the support of the Youth in Action ProgrammeAction 3.1 – Cooperation with the Neighbouring Countries of the European Union

danilodolci.org

semco Social Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communities

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PUBLIC REPORT

SEMCO – Social Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communit ies

Action 3.1 - Cooperation with the Neighbouring Countries of the European Union

DG Education and Culture - Youth In Action Programme

 

 

Edited by CSC DD

danilodolci.org

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This communication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

 

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PARTNER ORGANISATIONS

Centro per lo Sviluppo Creativo “Danilo Dolci” – Italy Waseela for training and development – Egypt Mugen Group – Israel BiedribaPozitiva Doma – Latvia AmelAssociation International – Lebanon The Vag Organisation – Malta Youth Future Association – Palestine Juzoor Foundation – Palestine The Foundation Supporting of the Innovation and the Creativity Development “InnCrea” – Poland Associação para a Formação e Desenvolvimento do Montijo – CMM – Portugal Kulturno izobraževalno društvo PINA – Slovenia Fundación Maimon – Spain Association «La Volonté» pour le développement de Metline – Tunisia Promotion &Appui au Développement d'Initiatives Locales – Tunisia Dacorum Council for Voluntary Service – UK

Association Union Jeunesse Euromed Algerie – Algeria

Association pour le dèveloppement et l’animation culturelle - Algeria

 

 

 

 

 

 

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INDEX  

SEMCO in a nutshell…………………………………………………….…….………………….4

SEMCO’s Programme and Learning Flow………………………………………………6

TOOLS & METHODS…………………………………………………………....................... 7

CONTACTS……………………………………………………………………..……………………..16

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“SEMCO” IN A NUTSHELL

ORIGINS

During the last years all nations in the world have seen the economic crisis spreading poor and inequalities. At the same time, there are new challenges for our societies, e.g. a growing intercultural dimension that, unfortunately, is often linked to increasing social conflicts and integration problems; the rampant spread of poverty and inequalities leading to an intensive marginalisation phenomena; a general dissatisfaction and skepticism about the future especially for young people due to the lack of the work and effective tools to fight unemployment etc.. To be brief and to the point, unemployment, social exclusion, inequality and poverty are at the heart of young people’s concerns for the future. They are among root causes of instability and unrest and need to be addressed to make societies sustainable.

"Social Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communities" (SEMCO) Training Course came from the recognition that social entrepreneurship plays a crucial role in our societies today and providing young people with social entrepreneurship skills can contribute to increase their opportunities in the job market as well as fostering inclusive communities. As stated by the European Economic and Social Committee, «social enterprise is closely linked to the EU 2020 Strategy and makes a significant contribution to society».

The SEMCO Training Course took place in Baida, a neighbourhood of Palermo, in

an amazing old convent with suitable working spaces and logistical arrangements. The TC involved 15 partners and 26 participants (youth leaders, youth workers, youth advisers) coming from Italy, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, UK, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, Tunisia, Israel. An 8-day Training Course aimed at encouraging social entrepreneurship at Euro-Mediterranean level. It promoted skills and tools that can help youngsters to turn ideas into concrete actions, thus contributing to their own professional growth and to the empowerment of their local community.

The Training Course spread knowledge about the value of social entrepreneurship as tool to develop innovative solutions to meet public needs and to build social cohesion, inclusion and active citizenship. Moreover, SEMCO gave a room to the priorities set up by the Italian EU presidency 2014 which focuses on the importance to promote the Mediterranean area as an opportunity for all of Europe.

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SEMCO’s OBJECTIVES

ü to promote social entrepreneurship as a key skill for the empowerment of young people and for the social/economic growth of their local community;

ü to stimulate the sense of initiative, entrepreneurship and creativity of young people by giving to participants concrete tools to develop social entrepreneurship initiatives at local level;

ü to spread information about European Programmes and policies on social entrepreneurship;

ü to promote active citizenship and EuroMediterranean dialogue by also shining light on the Italian EU 2014 presidency action in the field of Mediterranean cooperation.

SEMCO’s WORKING METHODS

The main methodological approaches were based on the UNESCO Four Pillars of Education:

ü Learning to Know ü Learning to Do ü Learning to Live Together ü Learning to Be

Moreover, the Reciprocal Maieutic Approach – Danilo Dolci’s tool for people empowerment – was widely used during the working days.

The working methods were composed of:

-­‐ energizers and ice-breaking activities -­‐ group-building games -­‐ working and focus groups -­‐ Organisations’ Bazaar -­‐ debates and oral presentations -­‐ Open Space Technology and World Caffè networking methods -­‐ Creative Thinking methods and idea-generating tools.

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SEMCO – Social Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communit ies

11th- 19th October 2014

YiA 3.1 – Cooperation with the Neighbouring Countries of the European Union

Saturday 11 Oct

Sunday 12 Oct

Monday 13 Oct

Tuesday 14 Oct

Wednesday 15 Oct

Thursday 16 Oct

Friday 17 Oct

Saturday 18 Oct

Sunday 19 Oct

Mor

ning

9.3

0-13

h

Welcome and

accommodation

of participa

nts

SEMCO’s presentation

Group warming & first encounters

Expectations, motivations, concerns

and contributions

What’s my country like?

Euromediterranean map of youth

unemployment and exclusion

Key factors of change

Skills to be social entrepreneur

(II): developing creativity and

innovation

It works! example of a local social enterprise

How to build a social enterprise: Social Enterprise

planning II

HUB of Ideas (Open Space Technology)

Project Design and

writing session

Market of Ideas

Departure day

Aft

erno

on 1

5– 1

8.30

h

Ice-

breaking and

group building activities

What’s social

entrepreneurship?

Organizations’ Bazaar

Daily Evaluation

Skills to be a social entrepreneur I:

introduction

Communication (I)

Communication (II)

Daily Evaluation

Skills to be social Entrepreneur III:

intercultural skills

Skills to be social Entrepreneur III:

intercultural skills II

Daily Evaluation

How to build a social enterprise:

social Enterprise planning I

Daily Evaluation

Action Planning: How to transfer

social entrepreneurship

skills

Limitations and barriers

Daily Evaluation

Financing for

social enterprises

EU &

EuroMediterranean Programmes and policies on

youth work

Daily Evaluation

My Ideas, my

world, my future

Final Evaluation and Youthpass

Even

ing

20h

Dinner Welcome

Party

Dinner

Intercultural evening (I)

Intercultural evening (II)

Movie evening Dinner and free evening

Farewell dinner

SEMCO’S PROGRAMME and LEARNING FLOW

*The SEMCO workprogramme, introduced and explained to the participants, has been accompanied with its graphic analogue with the aim of stimulating process of creative thinking of participants.

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TOOLS & METHODS THE “CLOTHES LINE”: collecting expectations, concerns and contributions. The activity for effective collecting of hopes/expectations, fears and offers of participants has been implemented through the “Clothes Line” method. After introduction of the learning objectives of the current activity by the trainer, the participants received papers on which items of clothing to be drawn. In this activity each item of clothing stands for a different kind of expectations – Hopes/Expectations, Fears, Offers to the programme that they wish to make. After reflection, they wrote their different ideas related to each category on the clothing shapes and hung in the working room. After work has been done, everyone had a chance and time to look at the “laundry” of the others which has been put on the wall and remained there through all the cycles of the TC. It helped both participants to remain focused on their needs during all working days and the trainers to take into consideration their demands.

Detailed description of this tool can be found in the T-Kit No. 10 “Educational Evaluation in Youth Work”, p. 66:

https://www.salto-youth.net/tools/toolbox/tool/training-kit-educational-evaluation-in-youth-work.754/

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INTRODUCTION TO THE TC’s MAIN CONCEPTS

After a brainstorming on the Key Concepts related to the notion of the social

entrepreneurship, participants were split into groups in order to discuss the following topics:

ü Human/ Social/ Political Capital ü Knowledge-based economy (KBE) & Knowledge-based society (KBS) ü Social entrepreneurship ü Smart/ Sustainable/ Inclusive Growth

After a group work, the “ambassadors”- representatives of each group - presented

the results of the group discussion in the plenary. It is interesting to point out the main results achieved:

Understanding of the concept by participants

Questions of participants to be unleashed during

the TC Human/Social/Political Capital

- Fair play - Humans are in focus - Combine united agendas of different groups to make a change - The power of the people for development and global change

- How is political capital and society related? - How can a social political capital influence politics without intervening with political parties?

KBE & KBS - Education in focus - The knowledge required to understand society - Having knowledge on linkages between society and economy - Opportunities, development, cost-effectiveness

Where we can find this knowledge? Best place?

Is economy the most important thing for society to survive?

Social entrepreneurship

- Enterprise which devote earning to society, for society growth, for social inclusion - Helping people to turn ideas into actions to benefit the society - By its using we can solve some of the society’s problems

What make a social entrepreneurship different from social body/social movement? What is the perfect way to use this function to develop the society?

Smart/ Sustainable/ Inclusive Growth

- Specific, measurable, attainable, realistic/reliable, time-bound - Culture, society, business models, project, opportunities are the methods to be used - Plan/strategy for future goals and needs in society - Preferred way of how the economy should grow and reach its climax for the better society

How can you decide on the best option for sustainable growth?

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ORGANISATIONS’ BAZAAR

At the Organizations’ Bazaar every organisation had a booth where they shared their promotional material (brochures, posters, manuals, flyers etc.) and organizations’ information, and simulated a “bazaar”. All the participants visited each booth and interacted with each other, and discovered more about each others’ organisations in a way that brought to life the dynamics of a bazaar.

WHAT MY COUNTRY LOOKS LIKE?

EUROMEDITERRANEAN MAP OF YOUTH UNEMPLOYMNET AND EXCLUSION

In this activity participants were divided in national groups. Equipped with flipcharts, colours and colour papers, they worked on presentations focusing on the mapping of their countries’ problems regarding youth unemployment and exclusion. Participants used different sources of information (researches and statistical data) and presented to the group their results. After the presentation a debriefing discussion was facilitated by the trainers. Common problems and causes regarding youth unemployment and exclusion among the EuroMediterranean countries were identified and discussed.

KEY FACTORS OF CHANGE

The activity has been implemented through the method of World Café which is simple, effective, and flexible format for hosting group dialogue. The implementation stages included:

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1) Setting: Created a "special" environment modelled after a café - small tables covered with a checkered tablecloth and with five chairs at each table.

2) Welcome and Introduction: The host started with a warm welcome and an introduction to the World Café process, setting the context, sharing the Cafe Etiquette, and putting participants at ease.

3) Small Group Rounds: The process started with the first of four of five-minute rounds of conversation for the small group seated around a table. At the end of the twenty minutes, each member of the group moved to a different new table. One person as the "table host" stayed for the next round and welcomed the next group and briefly filled them in on what happened in the previous round.

4) Themes: rounds have been focused on defining four concepts – key factors of success according to the “Inclusion Through Employability. Youth Work Approaches to Unemployment” SALTO booklet.

ü Involvement and participation ü Holistic coordination and government ü Non-formal learning ü Entrepreneurship

5) Harvest: After the small groups individuals were invited to share results/insights/feedbacks from their conversations with the rest of the large group. These results were reflected visually by using graphics and schemes. *An approximate time for the carrying out of this activity is 90 min. For more information, please refer to: http://www.theworldcafe.com/method.html SKILLS TO BE A SOCIAL ENTREPRENEUR (COMMUNICATION)

Session on the development and advancement of the communication skills has been composed of two parts. First part has been explained by the trainer by putting the main emphasis on the communication as a two way process, ways of communication participants’ ideas on their social enterprises, and nowadays changing paradigm of communication. At the second part of the session participants have explored the “Train Trust” tool with the aim to the communicative process at the grass-root level as they experienced more closely the terms to establish communication, i.e. sender, receiver and the information. They were

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split into two groups, each one composed a queue. Everyone was blindfolded except the last person of the “train”, who played the role of the driver. Participants, without talking, moved around the place taking orders from the drivers of groups. The message passed from one to another from the end to the head of the train, who directed the movements on the basis of information received.

SKILLS TO BE A SOCIAL ENTREPRENEUR (DEVELOPING CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION)

Session has been started with the introduction of the “Changing Education Paradigms” concept developed by Sir Ken Robinson, world-renowned education and creativity expert, and being visualized with the respective video projection:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U

Then participants were introduced to the differences between the critical thinking and creative thinking ways by shifting attention from the problem towards the challenge and its further direction to the personal challenge with its idea for solution. Being split into 4 groups of 5-6 people, participants were asked to create a Map of Thinking by using most common creative thinking methods. Groups have being analysing four problems/challenges:

ü Corruption ü Drugs ü Unemployment ü Immigration

SKILLS TO BE A SOCIAL ENTREPRENEUR (INTERCULTURAL SKILLS)

This session introduced participants to the so-called “Iceberg concept of culture”, made them aware of the importance of the intercultural skills in becoming a social entrepreneur. Participants brainstormed about the meaning of culture and played the «speed dating” exercise with fixed themes for 2-minute sets for discussion regarding intercultural communication. Participants had to form two circles of chairs (inner and

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outer) and each time after trainer’s signal participants had to move to the next chair. Tolerance of ambiguity, behavioural flexibility, communicative awareness, respect of otherness, knowledge discovery, empathy were among the main themes discussed.

Find more about the “Iceberg concept of culture”: http://www.swyaa.org/resources/handbook/Index/THE%20CONCEPT%20OF%20CULTURE.html Description of the Speed “Dating” exercise can be found at the following link: https://www.salto-youth.net/tools/toolbox/tool/speed-dating.1553/ SOCIAL ENTERPRISE PLANNING

A theoretical session was held for participants to fully understand the concept of Social Enterprise Plan and its seven Key Elements:

1. The problems 2. Vision and Mission 3. Theory of change 4. The solution (idea) 5. Social Impact 6. The team 7. Financial Summary

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Then participants were split into groups and developed their own Social Enterprise Plan based on the above-mentioned Key Elements. After group work, Plans have been presented in a funding raise simulation to three trainers and got specific feedback/do’s/do not’s on them. Trainers represented points of view on the financing opportunities of the European Commission, bank and private investor.

FINANCING FOR SOCIAL ENTERPRISES

The comprehensive session on the Social Enterprise Planning has been completed with the presentation of the sources for its financing available. This presentation was composed of the explanation of the following financing instruments: COSME (the EU programme for the Competitiveness of Small and Medium-sized enterprises running from 2014 to 2020), HORIZON 2020 (the SME instrument that helps high-potential SMEs to develop innovative ideas), JEREMIE (Joint European Resources for Micro and Medium Enterprises), Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs et al.

The oral presentation has been accompanied with the corresponding videos, thus it allowed to conduct a session in an interactive way with high level of participants’ involvement in discussion.

For detailed information on the above-mentioned tools, please refer to the following links: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/initiatives/cosme/index_en.htm  http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/ http://www.erasmus-entrepreneurs.eu/ http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/thefunds/instruments/jeremie_en.cfm

LIMITATIONS AND BARRIERS

At this session participants used the brainstorming method to discuss the limitations and barriers at the elaborating a social enterprise. Moreover, they have developed the “problem tree analysis”. Later they were asked to write all their personal limitations and what

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they think of as personal barriers in their efforts. As a closure of this session a debriefing among the participants took a place with putting an emphasis on the possible solutions to overcome these limitations/barriers.

At the end of the debriefing, a “WordCloud” of the limitations/barriers of the participants has been created and presented to them. The “ winning” words that were most common listed as limitations was lack of money and time. Learn more about the “problem tree analysis” here http://evaluationtoolbox.net.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=28&Itemid=134 HUB OF IDEAS

The session has been developed through the methodology of Open Space Technology.

Participants had the opportunity to develop their own project ideas, as well as contribute to other project ideas with their experience and knowledge. They reflected, proposed and shared ideas, describing future project’s resources needed, activity, target group, outputs, outcomes and impact in a paper. After that, they presented to other participants projects developed. Participants invited each other to participate in own project and joined the ideas they liked, giving their availability and support to the projects’ development. For further information on the Open Space Technology, please refer to: http://www.kstoolkit.org/Open+Space

EUROPEAN AND EUROMEDITERRANEAN PROGRAMMES

EuroMediterranean policies and programmes related to the international cooperation and youth work has been presented by the trainers. Those included transition from the ENPI CBC MED Programme towards the European Neighbourhood Instrument, Erasmus +, Anna Lindh Foundation et al. Moreover, participants became aware of the “Slow Food as a Means of Dialogue in the Mediterranean context – SlowMED” Project currently being implemented by the CSC DD under the ENPI CBC MED Programme.

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For further exploration, please follow the links:

http://www.enpicbcmed.eu/ http://www.enpi-info.eu/ENI http://www.annalindhfoundation.org/ http://slowmed.eu/

EVALUATION

*Pre- , and post-evaluation questionnaires have been developed and sent to the participants before and after the TC respectively. Pre-evaluation questionnaire contained questions on the participants’ expectations, previous experiences, as well as possible contributions to the TC’s implementation. Post- evaluation questionnaire was aimed at the assessment of all the activities carried out throughout the SEMCO’s implementation, level of participants’ satisfaction on the learning and logistic matters as well as extent to which initial expectations have been met. *Daily evaluation groups: Participants were divided into 4 groups/“Italian Families”. “Families” had daily gatherings to discuss the activities of the day and have a room for their feedbacks/ proposals. For reflection on the personal level the “Blob Tree” technique has been used: http://www.blobtree.com/ *STEP evaluation: At the last session, numbers from 1-10 (with one to be not satisfied and 10 to be very satisfied) were placed on the floor and participants were asked to move to the number it represented their opinion about the course and if wanted to tell more about their choice.

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Contacts

Centro per lo Sviluppo Creativo “Danilo Dolci”: www.danilodolci.org

For further information, contact alberto.biondo@danilodolci.org

CENTRO SVILUPPOCREATIVODANILO DOLCI

semcoSocial Entrepreneurs for Mediterranean Communities

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This communication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot

be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

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