The long awaited launch of School for Social Entrepreneurs West Midlands officially took place earlier this week. The event was bursting with energy and all attendees welcomed SSE with open arms, confirming that, establishing a presence in this region is long overdue.

Social enterprise is certainly not new to the West Midlands. In attendance were a long list of well-established active social entrepreneurs. It was a great opportunity for networking, promoting and collaborating.

Social entrepreneur and CEO of the new School, Charles Rapson, spoke about his passion for SSE and thanked the local funders who have made it all possible.

Attendees also heard from two inspiring social entrepreneurs who have been through London programmes; Joel Davis of Tutors United who graduated from a start-up programme in February 2013 and Martin Hogg of Citizen Coaching CIC, who is a West Midlands local, near to completing ‘Lloyds Bank Scale-up Programme’. Both spoke with enthusiasm and fondness for SSE’s action learning approach and really whet the appetite for the handful of audience members who are due to start on the new schools inaugural programme next month.

To top it all off BBC Midlands ‘Today Programme’ also made an appearance and ran a live broadcast from the event (but to Charles’ dissatisfaction didn’t provide a make-up team!).  After the events huge success everyone is eager for the school to start delivering its first programme to the cohort of 20 pioneering social entrepreneurs. Projects in the inaugural cohort include bringing digital technology to older peoplet, horticulture for NEETs and a therapeutic horse centre which promotes the emotional well-being of adults with mental disabilities.

Keep up to date with the West Midlands school by following them @SSEWestMids