Why
Sweden struggles with many challenges in areas of segregation, criminality, educational and social exclusion. Our social entrepreneurs address several of these challenges and offer innovative solutions to some of our society’s greatest problems. Their work results in inclusion, empowerment and the opportunity for a better life among children and youth.

How
Our social entrepreneurs often come from the target group themselves and have the experience, knowledge and understanding of what works and gives the best results. By supporting them with the development of their organizations and businesses their solutions can reach and make a difference in the lives of more children and youth.

What
With the support of Kinnevik, Kivra & Hogia we are able to provide capacity development to an entrepreneur working with Ukrainian refugees in Sweden as well as nine other entrepreneurs supporting Swedish children and youth in the areas of inclusion, empowerment, education and other areas.

In the context of rising inflation, renewed geopolitical instability, the recovery from Covid-19 and the global climate crisis, it is very important to continue to strengthen individual and societal resilience in the Baltic Sea region. Its central element is ensuring that all members of society have equal access to a sustainable, dignified livelihood and the tools, training and support needed to achieve it.

The EU has recently recognized social entrepreneurship as an essential tool for strengthening the resilience of European societies and has particularly emphasized the sector's suitability for younger generations, who are unlikely to see a conflict between making a profit and creating social impact. However, the industry's visibility remains low, especially outside the region's major cities.

Therefore, the goal of this project is to unleash the power of social entrepreneurship as a mean to support the self-development and self-sufficiency of disadvantaged young people (up to 25 years old) in Finland and Latvia. The goal of the program is to develop an entrepreneurial mindset for participants, transferable cross-industry skills, and most importantly, to create a clear understanding of how to start their own socially oriented business.

Within the framework of the program, two training cycles will be implemented, i.e. bootcamp and leadership camp for 120 young people from Latvia and Finland, followed by optional participation in the Innovation Lab, which will provide access to online training sessions (coaching) to continue the individual training program and improve the prototypes. After completing the program, the young social entrepreneurs will be supported in their further development in the long term by inviting them to join the network of social entrepreneurs.

The approach of the project is based on cross-border exchange of experience between NGOs, in-depth evaluation of results also at intermediate stages, optimization of adaptability and possible repeatability. The project will end with several information dissemination events and experience exchange.

Planned results: 120 disadvantaged young people from Latvia and Finland are involved in the project activities.

Project partners: Reach for Change Latvia association (leading partner), Lahti Diaconia Foundation (Finland), South-Eastern Finland University of Applied Sciences (Finland) and Radošās idejas association.

The project is implemented from April 1, 2023 to September 30, 2025. 

The total funding of the project is 741,734.26 euros. Co-financing of the Central Baltic 2021-2027 program in the amount of 80% has been allocated for the implementation of the project.

The project is co-financed by the Society Integration Foundation from the state budget of Latvia allocated by the Ministry of Culture. 

While most NGOs and CSOs are aware of the importance of impact measurement, the barrier to creating replicable and sustainable structures/toolkits or hiring consultants to accomplish this is much too high and/or expensive. Other priorities, such as the needs of their beneficiaries or finding funding, often take a higher priority within the organization, making it difficult to sustain quality impact measuring. This is problematic because not only does it keep an NGO from developing better and more relevant programs for their beneficiaries, but it also becomes increasingly more difficult to scale their programs without proof that the solutions themselves work. Keeping many vital solutions from scaling and reaching more beneficiaries in their target groups, as well as attracting more and larger investments. 

In the project “Strengthening Impact Measurement within Civil Society Organisations”, Reach for Change works together with the independent civil society organizations; Civic Alliance Latvia (CAL), and Social Economy Ukraine (SEU) to strengthen the ecosystem's ability to measure and manage their impact. The project is funded by the Nordic Council and will be ongoing until February 2024.

The project will consist of two modules; Module 1 will focus on training CAL and SEU in impact measurement tools and toolkits. The first module will focus on; Problem analysis using: The Problem Tree Method, solution description, and mapping of the target group. This is followed by developing an impact results chain, indicator selection, developing a plan for data collection, and qualitative and quantitative tools for impact measurement. In Module 2, we will focus on a “train the trainers” approach and capacity-build CAL and SEU on how to train their member organizations to use the toolkits and share knowledge. The activities will explore ways to hold training for their members in impact measurement, and timelines, as well as, how NGOs can communicate their impact to their beneficiaries, partners, funders, and the public.