Scaling For Impact

Wave of change Growing Social Impact Projects

RSA Fellows Lead The Way Unleashing Creativity Get behind The Global Goals

Photo by Shalom Jacobovitz

February 2016

We are interested in

supporting schools to

help their students to

become creative thinkers,

confident communicators

and empowered leaders.

Burning2Learn attends business, education, leisure and entertainment events all year round to learn more about career routes and post-education options on offer to young people in today’s job market. At each event we explore different pathways into a variety of industries and gather personal experiences and advice from professionals on the core skills needed to flourish within their respective fields. Our aim at this RSA’s event was to learn from the key messages of industry leaders so that they can be transfered into a language that would engage 10-19 year olds. Our experience has proven this to be an authentic, relevant and effective way of preparing young people for life in modern Britain.

Alan Dean, Managing Director Burning2Learn Media Team

01322 614000 schools@burning2learn.co.uk www.burning2learn.co.uk @burning2learn/Twitter.com

SCALING FOR IMPACT Royal Society of Arts Event

Entering the Ecological Age Global Goals Doing Learning Differently Changing one thing you do Water Independence Be Enterprising Driven By Social Goals Kick-start to financial independence Transforming social enterprise Join our team

RSA’s Mark Hall kicked off the evening by asking who in the audience owned a mobile phone. He later revealed that in 1877 Alexander Graham Bell gave the first practical demonstration of his new invention, the telephone, in the very room that the audience were stood in. Mark commented, “I wonder what first time ideas will come out of this room today?”

The Royal Society of Arts (RSA) is a charity that unleashes human creativity and empowers the evolution of powerful ideas. As part of their work starting, sharing and scaling social impact projects, the RSA hosted a ‘Scaling For Impact’ event in February 2016. The event welcomed distinguished guests and RSA Fellows to meet the experts behind a selection of successful social impact projects, and to learn from their top tips!

This event report has been created by Burning2Learn to share stories of projects with positive social impacts, and to transfer key messages and highlights from the business sector into the education world.

Our thanks go to Mark Hall, Lou Drake and Antigoni Boulougari for organising and facilitating this excellent event.

Visit www.burning2learn.co.uk and see more of our latest event reports.

Entering the Ecological Age: The Engineer’s Role

Professor Peter Head CBE FREng FRSA is shaping the wave for us all Many of us are familiar with the challenge of finding a solution to a practical problem set to us by our teacher. You may have been tasked with designing a new menu for the canteen that reduces the amount of food waste, or perhaps a more energy efficient appliance for controlling heating at home. Imagine having to apply that kind of thinking to a project - not just to help your classmates - but to the an entire city.

At this event, Peter shared his tips on smart ways to mobilise more efficient and effective long-term investment in city regions. He shared a story about his visit to Bellagio last year, where he opened the Finance for Sustainable Development Goals High Level Meeting. Here, he discussed finding viable pathways for scaling innovation quickly, handling barriers, mobilising leadership and ensuring openness.

Peter Head formed a Trust in 2011 to do precisely that. The Ecological Sequestration Trust creates models in a similar way to combat challenges that we face in the world today. These challenges include climate change, demography and resource-scarcity.

Peter also spoke about a digital platform that he is developing which gives cities/regions access to an unprecedented amount of useful information and resources. The platform is called resilience.io and he described it as a surfboard for society to ride out the economic tsunami ahead. Resilience.io will be an open-source platform that enables all data to be freely accessed by the public. Peter and his team are now looking to build and test their model in Dorset, UK and Accra, Ghana.

The EST believes that many of these problems could be solved through the establishment of circular cities, collaborative cultures and step change planning.

Step change is a change in policy or attitude that will result in improvement or increase.

To read more about Peter’s story, click here

To learn more about the EST platform, visit their website: http://resilience.io/

How can step change improve one of the problems in your local community? What would your first step be and who could you collaborate with?

Which three goals would you pick to work on in your town?

Send your choices to us at schools@burning2learn.co.uk

The Global Goals

Did you know?

Professor Peter Head CBE was one of the contributors to the development of the Global Goals and helped to produce Goal 11: Sustainable Cities & Communities

For Sustainable Development The Global Goals are the biggest attempt in human history to make the world a better place. Established by the United Nations in September of last year, the 17 goals are geared towards achieving three core objectives:

The Goals have turned heads all across the globe with many familiar faces showing their support.

Famous faces include James Bond star, Daniel Craig, American Actress and Singer Jennifer Lopez and the world’s biggest boyband, One Direction.

Each individual, group, community and region that pledges their support can make a real difference in their own way. The goal is set for 2030, what impact will you make in the world between now and At this event, the RSA encouraged participants to then? learn more about the goals and to look into what they can do to help work towards them in their work www.globalgoals.org place or home life.

- End Poverty - Halt Climate Change - Fight injustice and inequality

Be Enterprising;

In yourself and in your organisation Robert Ashton talks about apprenticeships that are about more than just a qualification We are all familiar with the term ‘apprenticeship’ and the type of ‘learn on the job’ experience that they offer 100,000s of young people in the UK every year.

Our next speaker’s uniquely enterprising approach to apprenticeships focuses on developing young business apprentices that take more from their experience than a qualification alone. Robert Ashton explained how the Swarm Apprenticeships’ model enables young people to become more effective

within their job roles in two distinct ways: through practical training and understanding of their role; and by instilling a drive to the good of the company on the whole to help it grow.

Swarm is on a quest for enterprise and is looking for support for projects that regenerate communities, strengthen supply chains and support tenants.

www.swarmapprentice.org.uk

Water Independence: Just Add Sun

Gal Moore FRSA shares how solar device, Desolenator, makes it possible to transform sunshine into water

If you could invent something to combat one of the world’s environmental issues or climate concerns, what problem would you choose to overcome?

Imagine being able to purify water from any source and location in the world with the power of the sun alone. In 2014, this became a reality when Desolenator Ltd showcased their method of water distillation that operates entirely by the power of the sun. Water can now be purified without chemicals or filters in the ‘cheapest and most environmentally friendly’ method the world has seen to date. The Desolenator has a lifespan of 20 years (requiring little maintenance) and features solar panels, a boiling unit, LCD display, a battery, a feed to water pipes and all-terrain wheels.

The leaders behind this impressive clean technology venture aim to provide water independence to 1 million people by 2020. The Desolenator can be used for seawater desalination, independent drinking water, village supply and household use. Find out more about Desolenator’s patented water distillation method at: http://desolenator.com/

1 BILLION PEOPLE do not have access to clean water

In 2009, Hermione cycled from London to Morocco. Her supporters donated actions rather than money. What’s one thing that you could do differently that may also help the planet?

Changing one thing you do

to help you and add to the future Hermione Taylor asks fellows to pledge positive actions over money

454 campaigns 8,007 users 15,296 pledges If changing our behaviours and day-to-day life-style choices was simple, all teenagers would have empty washing baskets, completed homework, immaculate performance reports and a full and present PE kit...

But in reality, life doesn’t always turn out like that and it’s actually really tough to always do the things that we know are good for us.

Hermione and team member Rich represented the ‘Do’ Team when cycling from London to Paris over three days in December last year. In support of their efforts, the team did not ask for money. Unusually, they asked for support with action. They asked supporters to do things like waste less food, turn the thermostat down slightly or even cycle to work.

Do Nation works with individuals, businesses and universities to help people make small behavioural changes that add to their lives and to the greater good of the planet. Founding Director, Hermione Taylor shared her company’s story with the RSA and talked about how we can all make a difference through raising pledges; be that through making a pledge of your own or starting a campaign at work or amongst friends to raise pledges.

The Do team is a great example of how to share a message and engage with lots of people without common stumbling blocks having to crop up (limited access to funds or long-term donation of time). Each of the changes that people make are for themselves and of their own choosing, so it’s difficult to argue with that!

https://www.wearedonation.com/

Driven By Social Goals rather than by profit

Hettie Wetherill talks about the International Centre For Social Franchising Although social franchising is similar to commercial franchising, it is significantly different. The main contrast being that a social franchise is usually set up to enable people to work together and share ideas, not to maximise profit. Social franchises are usually created by a founder who is driven by a social goal, such as quality education for all children worldwide, or tackling the growing concern of climate change.

The International Centre for Social Franchising (ICSF) works with some of the world’s most promising social solutions in an aim to end some of the world’s greatest social needs. Speaker and friend of RSA, Hettie Wetherill, explained the ICSF’s vision and shared examples of some of their work. She described http://www.the-icsf.org/

how the ICSF believes that scaling up proven social projects is what’s needed in society, as this will enable them to operate on a much greater scale and subsequently work towards our global journey to transformational change.

If you were setting up a group to help support social issues in your community, who would you invite to become part of the group? Where would you host your meetings? What would the first three items on the agenda be?

“A secret pillow is a pillow that unfolds into a blanket as well as being a powerful vehicle for social change.”

A kick-starter to financial independence for all women

Fritha Vincent FRSA reveals the story of a group of women on an empowerment journey The Secret Pillow Project is an interesting example of moved on, Secret Pillow Project will once again be in how a business model or enterprise structure can be a position to offer the opportunity to more women. sustainable whilst continuing to support its staff.

Fritha shared her story as part of the Secret Pillow Project and described how their workshops, based in India, act as a kick-starter to financial independence.

Becoming a Secret Pillow producer is something that all women can do, and provides a strong sense of entrepreneurship and empowerment.

There are four stages of empowerment offered within this model: Training and Sample Production, Professionalism, Development and Independence and Diversification.

This model has a unique structure and is set up to ensure continual sustainability as a core objective.

By offering a diminishing return as the women’s skills increase, the groups of women are encouraged to become self-sustaining and to find ‘other routes to local markets with their products’. Whilst the price the women receive at stage 4 is still competitive, it is less than they are paid at stage 1. This unique model encourages the newly skilled and empowered women to diversify their income and become self-sufficient for themselves as a group. Once the women have http://www.secretpillow.org.uk/

You can help up-scale this social impact project by: 1)

Inviting Secret Pillow Project to come to your place of work with their mobile pop up shop to give a lunchtime talk

2)

Host a Secret Pillow Party and invite your friends

3)

Brainstorm ideas to form a creative partnership between your business and the project

4)

Pre-order a Secret Pillow from Fritha’s mini crowdfunding campaign. For every 3 pre-orders, another woman can be invited to attend a workshop Initiatives like this are having positive social impacts every day. How would you raise money, awareness or pledges for a social impact project in your community?

Over 1500 social entrepreneurs helped to make the world a better place so far

Doing Learning Differently Leonie Jarret speaking at the RSA about the School For Social Entrepreneurs

A social entrepreneur is somebody who creates an enterprise with the aim of solving some of society’s most pressing issues, or effecting social change.

They are ambitious, often thinking on a wide scale, persistent when tackling barriers that arise and creative when developing new ideas and solutions.

Speaker Jane Hatton of social enterprise, Evenbreak shared her experience of a course by the School For Social Entrepreneurs. Whilst she was initially unsure of what to expect from the course, Jane admitted that she originally applied because of the £15,000 grant available to successful applicants. Looking back on it now, she expressed how much more she got Leonie Jarret introduced the School for Social out of her experience than she ever expected! Jane Entrepreneurs and explained the effectiveness of emphasised the importance of peer-to-peer support empowerment. The Schools enables individuals to which the course had taught her. grow in confidence and enhance their practical business skills to help them start, sustain and scale www.evenbreak.co.uk their own social enterprises. You do not have to be an expert or to have years of experience, the school says there is no ‘typical’ student and that they support individuals at all stages of their projects.

The SSE was founded in 1997 and has gone on to become a global network, now operating in 12 locations across the UK with schools in Ireland, Canada and Australia. To learn more, check out their website: https://www.the-sse.org/

Transforming Social Enterprise

with business expertise David Seddon talks about national growth for great social enterprises Social Business Trust is on a mission to help scale-up the impacts of ‘high growth potential social enterprises’ by providing targeted cash grants and professional business support from its corporate partners. David shared that SBT has already accumulated an impressive portfolio of 13 social enterprises, which were selected from over 800 reviewed.

An example of their work can be found in the support that SBT has given the London Early Years Foundation since 2011. The Foundation provides education and care for young children across London, and SBT has helped with strategy development, legal advice, new reward schemes and financial modeling. http://www.socialbusinesstrust.org/

“It’s all about the core.”

If you were running a project in school or looking to set up an initiative of your own, which three values would you embed at its core?

Translating the message From Business to the Classroom “Ideas alone cannot change the world, but people working together can.”

He’s proved his ethos works in education for UK Students, and now B2L front-man Alan Dean is setting his sights further afield in Sri Lanka, India, USA and Canada.

The Junior Media Team has a great year lined up! If you are interested in taking part in one of our programmes or learning more about what we can offer your school, contact us at the details below:

01322 614000 www.burning2learn.co.uk

schools@burning2learn.co.uk

@burning2learn/Twitter.com