A dual purpose headline that not only reflects the fact that I’m back from holiday but also acts as a tribute to Jason Orange, who this week announced that he was quitting Take That. (He was one of the ones that isn’t Gary, Mark or Robbie).
Besides idle celebrity tittle-tattle, this week’s Have I Got Social Enterprise News For You picks up on the best bits from around the sector while I was away. There’s quite a lot…!
- Keep the votes coming for the our Social Entrepreneur of the Year award.
- Q: What do you get when you cross Margaret Thatcher and Che Guevara? A: The Social Economy Alliance!
- Better together? Not according to CAN and Senscot, who announced that they would no longer be accepting funds from Unltd to distribute grants in Scotland due to concerns that too many grants were going to private, for profit enterprises.
- If Labour win the election, they plan on creating a legal definition of social enterprise. (Unless they forget, of course.) What will we talk about at conferences?
- Labour MPs have also laid out their vision for the voluntary sector in ACEVO and CAF’s Red Book of the Voluntary Sector.
-
London+Acumen PITCH for social enterprise is now open for submissions (from across the country). Applications need to be in by Sunday 28th September.
- Our Chief Executive Ali took part in a learning seminar on ‘Generating income to reduce grant dependence’ at the Paul Hamlyn Foundation. You can read all about it here.
- Some sector jobs – HAGA (Haringey Action Group on Alcohol) are recruiting a SHINE co-ordinator for their new SHINE Enterprise Centre (applications by the 20th September. ICSF (International Centre for Social Franchising) are recruiting for a full time consultant.
- Nesta are providing grants of up to £10k to organisations to developing interesting research projects and policy proposals in fields that relate to innovation but where Nesta do not have a big programme in place. (Thanks to Claudia Demuth for the link).
- A provocative article from Charles Kenny (which makes some very good points): Sorry, Kids, Changing the World Takes More Than a Killer App.
- Are you an Islington based social entrepreneur who likes Play-Doh? If you are, then Play-Doh Pitch is the event that you’ve been waiting for. The next event is on October 7th and it’s co-hosted by SSE student Joanna Bevan. If Play-Doh isn’t enough to swing it for you, there will also be cocktails.
- SSE London student Lisa Stepanovic’s project is based at the Ian Mikardo school, which features in a Channel 5 documentary ‘Too Tough To Teach’ on Monday at 9pm. Trailer here
- If your organisation is involved with the rehabilitation of offenders and ex-offenders there is funding available from the Triangle Trust.
- SSE East of England Fellow Mona Shah is crowdfunding for her fantastic organisation Harry Specters. It involves chocolate!!
- SSE Cornwall are hosting ‘Tea, Cake and (good) Conversation’, a networking event on Thursday 2nd October from 4-6pm at SSE Cornwall Hub. Details on their Facebook page.
- Good luck to Sylvia and the team at SSE Northwest, who have been nominated for a Social Enterprise Network ‘Powerful Together’ award.
- SSE has also been nominated for a Corporate Engagement award, for the Lloyds Bank and Bank of Scotland Programme.
Our October courses:
- Leadership Development (2 days: Oct 17th + Nov 25th)
- Action Learning Facilitator Training (3 days: 17th / 18th Oct + 8th Nov)
Have a good week!