Shhh… can you hear that? I am writing this in absolute silence. Wonderful, brilliant, beautiful silence. The kids are back in nursery, my wife is at work and so for the first time in 90 days I’m alone in the house. It’s actually a little eerie. It does mean, however, that we’re back in our usual Friday morning time slot and I’ve actually had more than 30 minutes to put this together. Hurrah! I’m not sure if that means it’s any better than it has been or if it’s just taken me longer to write than it has been doing…
Enjoy the news…
- You need to be quick with this one, but we are running a 45 minute webinar at 1pm today looking at how should you manage cash in a crisis. It’s the first in our new Recover & Rebuild series, helping social entrepreneurs get back on their feet. Register now: https://bit.ly/2Ycbh4y
- We’re not the only people doing webinars (you’ve probably noticed, they seem to have got quite popular all of a sudden). Our friends at Lime Green Consulting are running a briefing looking at ‘Fundraising During Covid-190 on 10th July’. You’ll hear from experts on the impact of Covid-19 on different fundraising areas – what’s changed, what to expect next and how to respond. You can book a place here (note – we get a small commission for each place booked).
- Social enterprise Girl Dreamer are offering small, unrestricted, emergency grants to micro-small size organisations that are founded/led by young women or non-binary people of colour to help them through any needs they may currently have brought on by COVID-19. Grants of £100 – £1000 are available, and the deadline to apply is 15th June. You can find out more here.
- We are looking for people to contribute to a piece about the experiences of LGBTQ+ social enterprises. If you are an SSE student/fellow from a BAME background, we’d love to hear from you. Please contact [email protected] to get involved.
- I’m going to make a bold assumption and guess that you haven’t been thinking about Christmas too much recently. But if you are a UK-registered charity looking for some extra funds then The Big Give’s Christmas Challenge is now open for applications. It offers supporters of participating charities the opportunity to have their donation doubled – you need to apply here.
- We are looking for three individuals to join SSE’s Board of Trustees. We’re seeking Trustees that will bring new skills, knowledge and experience to help us fulfil our ambitions and amplify our impact. We’re particularly interested in recruiting Trustees that reflect the diversity of the students we support and are representative of the geographic areas we work in. If this sounds like you, apply by midnight on Sunday 12th July 2020.
- “I just can’t wait for the gym to be open” is not a sentence that I have found myself saying over the last few months (“I’m a gym member. I try to go four times a week, but I’ve missed the last twelve hundred times.”). So what I need is Dangerous Dads’ Dad Dancing Fit Club Online. Taking place every Tuesday and Saturday at 9am, it’s a fitness programme for all the family featuring ‘classic dad dancing moves from John Travolta and Rocky, to ZZ Top air guitars and The Robot.’ You can find out more here.
- We’ve launched ‘Virtual Volunteers’, a new platform connecting social enterprises with volunteer professionals. It’s free to use, both if you have a post that you need help with or if you can volunteer your skills. Check it out here.
- My colleague Hannah has taken a look at how community businesses are rebuilding in a new blog. For many it’s been a difficult period as income has shrunk but, as with much of the social enterprise sector, many have found ways to adapt. You can read the blog here.
- The Small International Development Charities Network are looking to build an understanding of how Covid-19 is affecting small charities working in international development and have put together a short survey to gather insight. The results will build meaningful conversations with influential groups, inform policy and the wider public and one respondent will win a luxury hamper. You can take the survey here.
- Kim McCabe of social enterprise Rites for Girls is hosting a talk on ‘Parenting our children safely through’ this Sunday from 10:00am – 11.30am, discussing practical ways to make the journey of growing-up safer, kinder and better supported, particularly through the adolescent years and especially in these changing times. You can book a place here.
- Children in Need have opened applications to their COVID-19 Next Steps Grant, which offers grants of between £5,000 and £80,000 to ‘help organisations with more complex service adaption, including additional staffing requirements’. The deadline to apply is July 1st.
- In Southwark, London, the council have launched a new Discretionary Grants Fund for businesses with 49 or fewer full-time employees) that have suffered a significant fall in income due to the COVID-19 pandemic that were not eligible for the Small Business Grant Fund or the Retail, Leisure and Hospitality Fund. Up to £25k is available and charities and social enterprises are eligible to apply. Details here.
- SSE Fellow Davie Parks’ social enterprise The Skill Mill has begun making socially and environmentally good face masks. They are practical and fantastic value, they don’t interfere with care sector supply and make an excellent marketing tool – you can get them made with your organisation’s logo on them. They are also washable and reusable so better for the environment than single use PPE. Order them here.
