The Erasmus+ project SESYCARE offers social entrepreneurship skills to young caregivers and provides them with opportunities for accessing EU funded projects. This is the second newsletter of the Sesycare project.

The Erasmus+ project SESYCARE offers social entrepreneurship skills to young caregivers and provides them with opportunities for accessing EU funded projects. This is the first Newsletter of the project.

On February 26th, 27th, 28th 2022 the Dutch Foundation organised the Dutch Sesycare Training Days at the venue Area071. The Sesycare training supports the capacity building of staff and stakeholders. During the workshops in Leiderdorp the principals of non-formal education and the objective of inclusion of young caregivers through social entrepreneurship were placed centre stage.

From Caregiver to Social Entrepreneur

From caregiver to social entrepreneur must be done step by step. Learning independently can be challenging, even for the brightest and most motivated young Caregiver / social entrepreneur. There are four key stages to independent learning, known as self-directed learning:

* Are you ready and motivated to learn and work hard to be a social entrepreneur?

* Setting social entrepreneur goals

* Engaging in the social entrepreneurial process; and

* Evaluating social entrepreneurial learning.

Area071 Study Visit

Director Bart Hoenen founder father of AREA071 shared with us his experience in working with young entrepreneurs and vulnerable groups. Bart mentioned several synergies with the University Leiden and the Leiden Bio Science Park, that “finds the keys for making animal and human lives healthier and longer.” This incubator provides solutions that have a huge effect on all our well-being. These could be drug innovations, but also medical instruments, or a new technology that doesn’t exist yet.

Some AREA071 Facts:

• Founded in 2012 as an hybrid incubator
• Program and support
• Started with 1500m2 open workspace
• Community: Areanauten
• Strong connections with education and research
• Positions in regional boards
• Growth to 8000 m2
• Meeting rooms and mini conference center
• Diversity
• One of the biggest startup hubs in the Netherlands

Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs

Andreas Stefanidis President Academy for Entrepreneurship (Greece) explained in which way social entrepreneurs in the European Union can benefit of this scheme for future entrepreneurs. Further Dr.Öğr.Üyesi AMAN SADO ELEMO https://gavsis.gelisim.edu.tr/aselemo/kimlik made a presentation on the psychological aspects of social entrepreneurship.

Sesycare Capacity Building by Entrepreneurship Video’s

During the Dutch workshops we have also talked a lot about inspiration and how to turn dreams into ideas, and ideas into start ups. One very inspirational video is Moonshot Thinking: Why aim for a 10% when you can aim for 10X? Instead of a mere 10% gain, a moon-shot aims for a 10x improvement over what currently exists. The combination of a huge problem, a radical solution to that problem, and the breakthrough technology that just might make that solution possible, is the essence of a moon-shot.

Inside the Mind of a Master Procrastinator

The TED talk presents in an innovative way how is the mind of a procrastinator and what procrastination means and implies: Enjoy the watch:

In about 10 days we will give our Dutch Sesycare Training days in Leiden, Holland. But before we get into that we have a little flashback to January 11th-12th 2022: The Erasmus+ project SESYCARE had a meeting in Turkey at the Instanbul Gelisim University. This 2-day meeting offered a lot of presentations regarding social entrepreneurship skills to young caregivers. The emotional component is something we should not overlook as a big part of their (entrepreneurial) work, which could lead to a Caregiver burnout.

Common Care Giving Problems

Although we are well aware that caregiving is almost like running an enterprise, all focused on care and taking care, caregiving has some common problems, which even sometimes leads to caregiver burnout.

Caregiver Burnout

One of the very interesting topics in Istanbul was: How can young caregivers cope with their burnout? It’s important to:

• Embrace the caregivers choice
• Ask for caregiving help
• Practising self-care
• Joining caregiver support groups
• Psycho education – through provision of skills and information we can assist the emotional and social well being of the caregiver
• Counseling interventions (provision of information, development of coping skills, stress management, cognitive reframing
• Establishing support groups

Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs

One of the other great presentations was about the Erasmus Young Entrepreneurs scheme. Andreas Stefanidis President of theAcademy for Entrepreneurship (Greece) explained the opportunities for young entrepreneurs and enterprise. Stefanidis will also present at the Learning Mobilities in Leiden on February 28th 2022.

Coming up: Dutch Sesycare Training Days

The Dutch Sesycare training will support the capacity building of the staff and stakeholders, thus staff will be trained in a training course, that follows the principals of non-formal education to promote the objective of inclusion of young caregivers through social entrepreneurship. The training activities in the Netherlands will aim at enhancing:

• Experience various ideas and concepts around employment, employability and entrepreneurship;
• Develop new lines of reflection and actions for improving support packages for young caregivers
• Outline of the successful Dutch Labour Market Strategies and Entrepreneurship Culture
• Set the basis for building a webinar and knowledge building around the concept ‘Work is treatment and Treatment is Work’;
• Discuss new pathways and strategies of Work, Entrepreneurship, Health and Quality of Life (Happiness)
• Give feedback (Learning Mobility report)

The Erasmus+ project SESYCARE is currently in Turkey at the Instanbul Gelisim University. The 2-day meeting on the 11th and 12th of January 2022 offers a lot of presentations regarding social entrepreneurship skills to young caregivers. A social entrepreneur is a person who pursues novel applications that have the potential to solve community-based problems. These individuals are willing to take on the risk and effort to create positive changes in society through their initiatives.

Agenda 2-Day Meeting Istanbul

Definition Social Entrepreneurship

There are several definitions of Social Entrepreneurship. In the SesyCare application we defined it as: ‘A social entrepreneur is a person who pursues novel applications that have the potential to solve community-based problems. These individuals are willing to take on the risk and effort to create positive changes in society through their initiatives.’

Wikipedia Definition Social Entrepreneurship

On Wikipedia they define Social entrepreneurship as ‘an approach by individuals, groups, start-up companies or entrepreneurs, in which they develop, fund and implement solutions to social, cultural, or environmental issues.’ Wikipedia is a volunteer-run project, a very interesting and succesfull entrepreneurial source format of ‘what you would like to know about certain topics, persons, institutions, organisations and companies. Why people always go to Wikipedia to know more about a certain topic or to get a definition is not clear for me. Wikipedia is not a reliable source and overrated (it does not have a scientific trademark). Wikipedia can be edited by anyone at any time. This means that any information it contains at any particular time could be vandalism, a work in progress, or just plain wrong…

Social Entrepreneurship is Entrepreneurship

We should not overcomplicate things. My definition on the topic social entrepreneurship is pretty clear:

‘‘Social Entrepreneurship is Entrepreneurship (with a Social Product and / or Service)’. It does not matter if your poduct or your service is to improve social issues through your businesses. You can only successfully tackle social issues while generating profit… You can only make a loss with your social enterprise for a short period, in the end you will go down without a profitable business model, unless your shareholders/ owners are (local) government(s). Keep in mind that due to an unhealthy ideology and neverending funding by local governments the chances on staying a social enterprise making (big) loss are more or less forever.

This article is part of a presentation given by Pieter van Schie MA on Zoom d.d. December 18th 2020 for the project Sesycare

The European Partnership ‘Social Entrepreneurship Skills to Young CAREgivers of people with chronic Illness, also known as SESYCARE is delighted to kick-off the project December 18th. The meeting will be follwed by a Webinar on Social Entrepreneurship and Young Carers.

SesyCare Project Outline

Sesycare Webinar

After the Zoom kick off, a webinar about social netrepreneurship will take place

For more information, click SesyCare project website

The Erasmus+ project SESYCARE offers social entrepreneurship skills to young caregivers and provides them with opportunities for accessing EU funded projects.

Young Carers

The Young Carers in this project are children or young people who look after family members who are ill or have disabilities. They take over similar caregiving responsibilities to those of adult family carers and need special support. The purpose of this project is to summarize the body of knowledge about young carers’ lives with a special focus on their personal experiences, the impact of caring, needs and coping behaviors and offer specific social entrepreneurship education and offer social entrepreneurship activities among such a vulnerable group.

Young carers are often hidden, forgotten or ignored by policymakers and service providers at national and local levels. They do not feature in the literature on community care, family care, and children’s rights; and young carers’ experiences and needs are not explicitly recognized in social and family policies. The long-term implications of caregiving responsibilities on young carers’ health or psycho-social development need to be further documented. Several studies according to the European umbrella association Eurocarers reported that many young people in families with chronically ill members are highly involved in caring. Due to this responsibility, they spend most of their time at home. Although the caregiving experiences are pervasive, young people conceal the conditions of their relatives from others. They also do not want to be identified as young carers. Thus, their social experiences are limited. These children or adolescents would like to live a “normal life”. They prioritize their family member’s needs over their own.

Those young people need professional support, which recognizes the real needs of their family members. A social entrepreneur is a person who pursues novel applications that have the potential to solve community-based problems. These individuals are willing to take on the risk and effort to create positive changes in society through their initiatives. A social entrepreneur is interested in starting a business for greater social good and not just the pursuit of profits. It is not rare that people who have a family history of illness in their family become aware of community-based problems. Several reviews show that since 2007 the situation of affected children and adolescents has achieved an important place in international research. Based on the included studies, it is possible to identify theoretical models that help to describe and explain the phenomenon of young carers.

In order to provide appropriate support and interventions, it is of importance for the professionals to know and consider that a family-oriented perspective is vital. We will focus on offering social entrepreneurial skills and inform them about EU funded opportunities and training for young people who wish to develop their social entrepreneurship.