Report on the fourth training "Sustainability for Social Enterprises"
S.E.E.D. – Social Entrepreneurship Education Development Project
4th Training "Sustainability for Social Enterprises"
Date: 02.05.2022-07.05.2022
Location: “Rade Jovchevski Korchagin” Skopje
Participants:
High school students and teachers from “Rade Jovchevski Korchagin”,
“Prva Sushachka Hrvatska Gimnazija”
Gymnasium of Lizdeik
Four volunteers from ARNO
In total 39 people coming from 4 different countries
Report Summary
The main goal of the SEED project is to bring entrepreneurship education even closer to the students through teaching the new business model of Social Entrepreneurship as part of the school subject “Entrepreneurship”, which is taught in the 3 schools (Croatia, Lithuania, North Macedonia), and exposing students to business communities. The SEED project is designed to enable students to become future Social Entrepreneurs. It is also designed for society to recognize the importance and role of communities (even the small ones can do a lot), as well as new, sustainable approaches in business and education. Through the SEED project, young people are learning essential skills for running a business while also learning about philanthropy, creativity, leadership and teamwork.
The 4th training was titled as “Sustainability for Social Enterprises” and it took place in the high school Rade Jovcevski Korcagin - Skopje North Macedonia from 2-7 May 2022. On this Training there were 38 participants from 3 countries partners in the project: 16 participants from N. Macedonia, 11 participants from Croatia and 11 from Lithuania. Participants were students and accompanying person- their teachers involved in social entrepreneurship education.
1. The first day began with a brief introduction about the training and followed by a few fun energizing activities that encouraged the students to introduce themselves and share their interests. After that followed a short discussion on the topic of SE.
2.. The second day started with a introduction about the project that was presented by Irina Janevska the President of ARNO. Then the participants played bingo and the best 3 won some small prizes.The next activity was the shoe game.This activity is used by ARNO in nonfromal education approaches as energizer. To walk in the shoes of others means to be able to speak openly about diverse social aspects. In local cultures what we notice is a trend among young people to use more environmental mission than social mission when prototyping business ideas on one hand, and on the other hand strong social inequalities, unjust societies etc.
The students were given the opportunity to talk about their experience with this activity of the project and give feedback as well as comments and criticism.
On the question “Have you previously participated at Trainings, Workshops or other learning events on the topic of Open Innovation/Design thinking? If yes, please tell us about your experience (how many learning experiences, where, when, provided by whom) “few participants wrote that they have been participating in trainings and workshops on this topic before and they think that this methodology is a perfect way to encourage creativity and team work. The trainings for design thinking methodology is something that they really like and enjoyed listening to. They have been participating in a workshop organized by ARNO on the topic “Online session: Social entrepreneurship from A to Z” and they liked and learned a lot from it about design thinking and social entrepreneurship. This comments mainly came from the Macedonian students as they listed the online session. There were no comments on the methodology itself, which leads us to assumption that they knew only theoretically “ Design thinking concept”, not by practice.
What will you do differently in your practice/service setting/life as a result of this Session?
Most of the participants after finishing the game felt empathy and they will look on others in a different way from now. Most common answers were:
-They will let the others speak more and they will try to listen to them more, also they will like to put them self in other shoes and look from others perspective not only theirs.
-They will try to connect with people’s problems and try to understand them more.
What do you feel were the strengths of this Session?
The strengths of the session for the participants were pointed in:
- the stepping out of their comfort zone
- talked with others (strangers) about their stories
- opening up and practicing empathy for each other.
In general the comments were in the direction “ … this was a perfect session to better know the people and to make stronger connection between us.”
What do you feel were the weaknesses of this Session?
Main comments for the weaknesses of the session for the participants were:
- They didn’t feel comfortable taking off their shoes (although It was shared/announced in the Participants kit, 3 weeks prior to arrival. Few of them reported that they didn’t want to tell some more detailed stuffs about themselves. Suggestions of one of the participants for this session was that instead of taking off the shoe, they could bring some object with a certain personal meaning. Another participants stated that the new generations are more introverted and it would have been more smooth for them if they received some specific questions to talk about not general questions.
After this activity the students present their 6 virtual SEs and 3 SEED fundraising events and a the end they started to prepared for the final event.
4. The third day the students have the opportunity to visit Social Enterprises in Skopje to listen to their stories and had the opportunity to ask some questions.After the visits the go back to the high school and had the Sustainability: SEED Talks a session with two guests Krisitijan Angelovski form National Agency and Kristijan Shopov the Eco Magician.
5. The fourth day the students visited Cineplexx, City Mall and they watched 2 movies with the topic of SE after the two movies the participants have the opportunity to ask questions to David Geer the ambassador of EU and director of one of the movies they watch
6.The fifth day the final event of the project was held. At the event, high school students and teachers from Macedonia, Lithuania and Croatia planted eco-cards from which flowers grow. Through the gesture of joint planting, the symbolics was shares- Social Entrepreneurship is a seed that should grow and be nurtured, for the society to see the fruits of the economy of solidarity faster.Supporters of social entrepreneurship also addressed the event: Barbara Sadovska – team leader of the EU project “Support to Social Enterprises”, Marko Gjorgievski – Director of the National Agency for European Educational Programs and Mobility, which is also a donor of the project, Dragan Arsovski – Director of “Rade Jovcevski-Korcagin” and Irina Janevska from the organization coordinator of the project – ARNO. In addition to planting the cards, the students organized mini creative workshops, and the magician Kristian Shopov performed a magical eco-performance and told the students that he was once a student at the school, and today is a successful social entrepreneur.At the end of the day, in teams students searched for sustainable development goals in Skopje.
7.The last day was meant to be for the evaluation and closing officially the 4th training,