“Social entrepreneurs are not content just to give a fish or teach how to fish. They will not rest until they have revolutionized the fishing industry’’, Yunus.The above quote has been the leading motto of our project. Cult-Up is a project that aimed at facilitating exchanges and enabling co-creative approach to social entrepreneurship for youth in the field of cultural heritage. Implemented by 6 partners located in two particular areas of Europe: the Mediterranean and East Europe from November 2018 (The European Year of Cultural Heritage) until November 2019. The organizing team gathered in Yerevan, in November 2018 for a program planning meeting, during which the program was given an action plan, budgeting and task delegation among the implementing countries. Also, tours and meetings were organized with social enterprises working in the sphere of social entrepreneurship.The project was structured around the Cultural Heritage theme: in fact, the experiences of the three Mediterranean countries (Greece, Portugal and Spain) in smart approaches to tourism and cultural heritage promotion have been the base for an exchange of knowledge, transfer and peer learning for the three eastern partners. Through this transnational cooperation action, we wanted to offer an opportunity to young people in Armenia, Georgia, and Ukraine for learning new methods and to start thinking about innovative approaches to a traditional sector such as cultural heritage. The general objective of the program was to build a pool of young people active and/or interested in the field of social entrepreneurship for cultural heritage. To achieve this the consortium partners set the following objectives: 30 young people increase their knowledge on social entrepreneurship and on cultural heritage, through capacity & skills-building activities; 30 young people are empowered to bring a positive and innovative change into their own local communities. The potential of working on Social Entrepreneurship for Cultural Heritage is established. Beneficiaries of the Cult-Up project were 30 young people from the 6 consortium countries. Indirectly, local communities and othe people of the areas also benefited from the implementation of the project directly or indirectly. Cult-Up was structured in a series of activities that empowered and connected the 30 young people, promoting the cooperation between the partners in the field of education and training and designing tools, as well as methods for their socio-professional development of youth workers and trainers.The following activities were undertaken throughout the Cult-Up program:1 international training, 6 international webinars, 1 toolkit on theory, practices and tools for Social Entrepreneurship for Cultural Heritage and 1 national multi-stakeholders workshop per country including private sector in the field of tourismAt the international exchange, held in May 2019 in Spain, participants from the 6 organizing countries exchanged experience and participated in various workshops. The venue itself was a living example of restoring a cultural heritage; an old depopulated village in Spain had been given a new life by hosting various projects, international groups, etc. This was one of the success stories the participants had the opportunity to explore. The workshops were held by successful social entrepreneurs, business people making a contribution in the area of cultural heritage, and of course by the program participants themselves, who shared their own projects, success stories, and failure cases, helping them to learn from mistakes and take measures for improvement. The project was summarized with multi-stakeholder meetings organized locally, where different parties (public, private sectors, policy-makers, development organizations, NGOs, etc.) gathered around to discuss the current situation and the development perspectives of cultural heritage and social entrepreneurship in the respective countries.

We started the projected looking at the unique opportunities that creative industries provide for young people, who are able to turn their creativity and ideas into added value products and experiences, thus becoming entrepreneurs and generating at least an income for themselves, if not employing other people as well, as employees or subcontractors.We had noticed that young people find it challenging to make the transition from idea or prototype to sustainable entrepreneurship, as they lack know-how, industry contacts and resources.Throughout the project we reached over 670.000 people, out of which more than 48% are young people interested in entrepreneurship. Out of this reach 163 participants enrolled in the project, 70 were selected and 63 participated in the national learning activities, 22 participated in the international marketing bootcamp, 4 of them covering their own travel costs, 19 launched crowdfunding campaigns which raised over 32.000 eur. 70% still continue the project developed throughout the program. The team formed by 6 entities in 6 cities from 4 European countries reached 103 people involved as project managers, trainers and mentors. The project will continue to support creative industries entrepreneurs as a complete package of learning materials, inspirational and practical case studies and full handbooks available both for aspiring creatives, as well as those who work to speed their success are shared online on the project website creativebusiness.studio. Moreover, the resources are available in 5 European languages – English, Romanian, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish on the city websites:•http://bucharest.creativebusiness.studio/•http://cluj-napoca.creativebusiness.studio/•http://madrid.creativebusiness.studio/•http://lisbon.creativebusiness.studio/•http://siracusa.creativebusiness.studio/•http://vigo.creativebusiness.studio/•http://creativebusiness.studio/

<< Objectives >>The ISIDE project aims to develop skills in the field of social and environmental sustainability for the benefit of the corporate population of SMEs in the territories involved by adopting training solutions in line with the evolution of technologies and multimedia languages and to promote digital integration in learning activities by training and aligning a pool of trainers with sustainability paths, business models and impact measurement methodologies.<< Implementation >>The activities are defined in detail within 5 distinct Work Packages:WP1: PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND COORDINATION, QUALITY ASSURANCE AND EVALUATION WP2: DESIGN OF LEARNING PROGRAMMEWP3: PRODUCTION OF INTERACTIVE AND GAMIFIED EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES AND TOOLSWP4: PILOTINGWP5: DISSEMINATION<< Results >>The project will provide the skills in the field of social and environmental sustainability regarding strategic paths, business models, organizational processes, measurement tools to the workers of SMEs in the territorial contexts of reference of the partnership. It will also retrain a pool of trainers and business consultants on instructional design and game-based learning to create a detailed evaluation process to be applied in the field during company check-ups.

<< Background >>The transition towards sustainability and circular economy is high on the political agenda of the UN (SDGs), the EU (Circular Economy Action Plan) and also in national legislation and policies (e.g. Austrian government program 2020-2024). A lot of initiatives, programs and projects underline the importance of getting SMEs and entrepreneurs “on board”. A lot of project funding schemes are available, which could be used to develop innovative circular projects and submit them for funding. Yet SMEs and entrepreneurs often do not have the resources (time) or skills (project development) to successfully develop a project idea from scratch, research potential partners, funding opportunities or develop sound and successful project applications. These skills are vital complements for policies and initiatives aimed at fostering sustainability and circular economy via funding, financing and (public) investment.While sustainability is often associated with regulations, higher costs, restrictions, doing less damage – not the best image for adoption by economic actors – circular economy offers a positive, innovative and business-oriented concept that offers ecologic, social AND economic benefits. While sustainability is mostly a political topic, circular economy addresses the need for innovation, within CASCADE’s target group: digital service companies (SMEs). With the 10-week digital circular project incubator training program developed in CASCADE, trainees can gain know-how on the different stages of an innovative project’s life-cycle (from idea generation to successful project application for funding) and apply the knowledge directly by creating a an innovative digital CE project application.We applied for CASCADE because we strongly believe that circular economy and the “green transition” need to go hand in hand with digitalization. Digital service companies (SMEs) can create a large impact, if they start developing digital products and services for circular economy. The use of these innovative digital CE tools will in turn enable the “going circular” for their users. With CASCADE we aim at offering an innovative VET approach for companies in the digital economy to develop projects for digitally supporting circular economy.<< Objectives >>CASCADE’s core objective is to empower digital service companies (SMEs) to develop IT-enabled innovative circular economy (CE) solutions as projects, including platform business models, sharing economy/collab consumption, product-as-a-service, in b2c but also b2b.CASCADE’s concrete objectives are-Increasing awareness and curiosity for the economic potential and benefits of circular economy in the digital economy-Breaking down barriers for the adoption of circular business approaches through IT-enabled solutions-“Spark innovation” for circular economy in the “digital world”, by training the target group on the full life-cycle of innovative, circular projects.-Foster intersectoral, interregional, and international cooperation to develop innovative circular economy projects.-Facilitate the transition to a more circular economy by engaging SMEs to “try out” circular economy in an innovative circular project.To achieve these objectives, CASCADE will create a 10-week digital circular project incubator training program for digital service companies (SMEs). Participants/Trainees will non-formally learn all skills needed for successfully developing innovative, digital CE projects.<< Implementation >>All project management activities (e.g. creation of a project management handbook, an online working environment, a share and promotion plan and related materials and activities, quality management and coordination activities) aim at the successful implementation of the project results.Following state-of-the-art project management structures, the project results will be implemented according to the detailed tasks and methodologies described in this application.The digital training materials will be developed based on research and a thorough needs analysis. Game-based, scenario-based and interactive e-learnings combined with explainer videos will be used to ensure the most “learning impact” in the target group and also to make the training materials motivating and self-explaining. E-learnings will be created with Articulate 360 (Rise/Storyline) and the explainer videos with Powtoon.Special attention and focus will be given to the sharing and promotion activities and cooperations with other projects and initiatives. All partners will actively promote and share CASCADE in their online channels and present and promote the project at events and conferences. Co-hosting events with related initiatives and projects and participating in related events will be done already starting in the kick-off phase (after positive evaluation of the application).<< Results >>In CASCADE, the following main results will be developed:-An integrated set of self-explanatory digital training modules for all stages of the life-cycle of an innovative circular project by digital service companies (SMEs).oR1: Inspiration and breaking barriers for circular economyoR2: System Innovation methodsoR3: Funding and financing optionsoR4: Project management basicsoR5: Proposal management-A digital environment (R6) that provides access to the training materials as well as to potential regional/national/international cooperative partners from different sectors and stages of the life-cycle.Each of the 5 digital training modules will consist of max. 30 minutes newly developed, motivational and inspirational game-based digital training, a “do-it-yourself”-section (with worksheets, templates, checklists, etc.) and a structured dive-deeper section, that offers at least 10 additional hours of self-study time. Complementary tasks will be included to immediately put the learning outcomes into practice. The digital training materials are developed to be self-explaining, but during the project, pilot test participants will be offered a free 45 minutes single coaching (online) on each stage of the project life-cycle by the project partners. In the final version, training participants will spend 2 weeks time on each of the training modules: one week for self-study and one week to complete the tasks, giving a total of 10 weeks from start to completed project and financing plan/proposal for project funding.Expected outcomes of CASCADE upon completion:-digital service companies (SMEs)/project participants/trainees develop their own original ideas for an innovative digital CE project from scratch to successful funding and implementation.-Multipliers along the life-cycle offer CASCADE to the target group (i.e. SMEs).-Multipliers from different sectors (higher education, adult education, schools, etc.) use CASCADE’s training materials for their own audiences.The outcomes shall further create the following impact:-Facilitating the transition towards a circular, sustainable economy in Europe.-More visibility for digital circular business models and circular economy “online” through projects implemented by digital service companies (SMEs).-Increased regional, interregional, national, international cooperation between SMEs and other organizations along the project life-cycle.The CASCADE results will be kept in use by the coordinator and partners after project end as a free complementary service for their commercial customers – as well as free to use for all, who are interested in circular project development or aspects of its life-cycle.

<< Background >>The partnership believes that this is an ideal moment to implement REACT!. The current context all over Europe is a context of shift to a more sustainable society, and the European Skills Agenda clearly indicates the need to provide young people with innovative and green skills, and enable them to REACT! to the current environmental and societal challenges.Young people in Europe are aware of these challenges and certainly have the aspiration to make society more sustainable. However, youth workers in most places do not have the right tools and curricula to support them. This is the case in the 5 countries of the partnership: Ireland, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain. Although these countries have placed sustainability and circular economy as priorities to address by their most recent long-term strategies, there still is much to be done to put this into practice. Youth workers need to have at their disposal educational resources covering topics such as innovation and entrepreneurship, green skills on circular economy (CE) and personal development, and be empowered to support young Europeans make the most of their aspiration to make their society more sustainable, and acquire relevant skills for the future. For this reason, the partnership has decided to develop an innovative curriculum, focusing on social entrepreneurship, CE and personal development, addressed to youth workers of the 5 target countries. The curriculum is composed of online learning resources, guidelines for trainers and inspirational materials produced with the engagement of young entrepreneurs.<< Objectives >>REACT! aims to achieve the following objectives:1. To develop a set of innovative learning tools for youth workers on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development, to upgrade their capacity to transfer to young people skills required by the current labour market and overall context; 2. To provide online learning on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development to a group of 100 youth workers in the 5 countries; and, 3. To build the capacity of a group of 15 youth workers to train and transfer to young people skills on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development<< Implementation >>The partnership is going to implement the following activities:Organise 4 Transnational Project Meetings to adjust objectives and create synchronicity and flow and strengthen institutional ties of the consortium members;Produce 1 State of the art needs assessment report on non-formal education offers on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development for young people in the 5 target countries (R1);Produce 1 Online learning curriculum covering basics on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development for youth workers/organisations working with youth (R2);Produce 1 Resource guide to train youth on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development (R3);Produce 1 set of inspirational videos of young entrepreneurs from the target countries (R4);Engage with 100 youth workers that will enrol in the online learning curriculum;Select 15 youth workers and deliver an international LTT - Bootcamp in Ireland (with preparation webinar previously) and provide skills to the 15 youth workers to organise a local training with young people;Organise 5 Multiplier events held for overall 250 people; and Conduct an online wrap up Festival at the end of the project.<< Results >>The project will produce four concrete Results, as follows: R1 - State of the Art & Needs Assessment);R2 - REACT! Toolkit online resource on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development;R3 - Resource Guide: training guide for youth workers on CE, social entrepreneurship and personal development; andR4 - Inspirational videos made ”for and by young people” as a complementary and inspirational tool to R1 and R2 with testimonials from young entrepreneurs. In addition, the project expects to: Develop a transnational community of youth workers and young entrepreneurs across 5 countries and provide a space for them to share experiences, good practices on CE non-formal education, and strengthen ties for future collaborations; Allow youth workers to put in practice the skills acquired by the project by conducting an activity with young people at the local level;Create a space for consortium partners to exchange non-formal education methodologies and practices on CE for young people, and strengthen ties for future collaborations; andEnable project partners to strengthen their connections with stakeholders working with young people in their and other countries in view of future potential collaborations.