According to Cree (2003), a young carer is a person whose life is affected by the illness or disability of someone in his or her family.
They may provide physical or emotional support for that person. Young carers may care for relatives who have a physical or learning disability, mental health problem, chronic illness or alcohol misuse problem. According to Becker, (2000), a particularly vulnerable group, that we will focus on, are young adults age 18-25. For those young adults the care load they have to shoulder is particularly heavy, their educational and vocational opportunities are limited by their geographical location and influenced by their domestic situation, and there are also intergenerational challenges present.
The project will target young carers,young people working for young carers and entrepreneurs and offer learning opportunities so that they can develop their social entrepreneurial skills.
Young carers are a group at risk of social exclusion and their career and educational opportunities are often limited by the role they play in the family. This situation necessitates professional support from multiple sources. Not only does it concern health services and education support services, but it may also call for family services.
A social entrepreneur is somebody who takes up a pressing social problem and meets it with an innovative solution.
These individuals are willing to take on the risk and effort to create positive changes in society through their initiatives.
Widespread use of ethical practices such as impact investing, conscious consumerism, and corporate social responsibility programs facilitate the success of social entrepreneurs. EPIONI, Anemos Ananeosis, and Consorzio SGS operate in the sector consisting of non-governmental organizations and other non-profits.
The project “Social Entrepreneurship Skills for Young CAREgivers of people with chronic Illness” ( acronym SESYCARE) targets young caregivers and aspires to overcome the above-mentioned problems by tools and methodologies that will enable young carers to develop their social and entrepreneurial skills.
In the context of the project we will
1) compile a guide of good practices in the support of young caregivers who wish to develop their social entrepreneurial skills
2) deliver six seminars and one webinar for the program “Erasmus for young entrepreneurs” 3) conduct a training in the Netherlands by our experienced partner DFW2W
4) hold three transnational meetings in Athens, Istanbul, and Lanciano. In these meetings, the hosting partner,EPIONI, the newcomer Anemos Ananeosis, our academic partner Istanbul Gelisim University (Turkey) and the social enterprise Consorzio SGS (Italy), will provide country-specific recommendations and conduct a focus group to determine the entrepreneurial skills that young caregivers need to develop for a successful career in the non-profit sector.
In the first year of the project, our partner DFW2W from the Netherlands, while hosting the short-term Joint staff training event in Leiden, will share their expertise and conduct study visits to relevant stakeholders.
The project will build on the existing experiences of countries, such as the Netherlands, which offer adequate training to young people who wish to develop their entrepreneurial skills.
Additionally, each partner will have to register at least two social entrepreneurs as “Hosts” in the “Erasmus for young entrepreneurs” platform.
As interest in the topic of carers is growing rapidly in Europe we included a relevant organization as associated partner.
Eurocarers, the European umbrella association working with carers will share good practices on how to reach young caregivers. Other associated partners that we thought useful to include are: the Academy of Entrepreneurship which will co-host, with EPIONI, seminars on “Erasmus for young entrepreneurs”, the Institute of Entrepreneurship Development from Larissa which will assist in organizing the Webinar, the University of West Attica which will help with the identification of young carers and the Saronic Nephrological Center which will share good practices for young carers.
A 3minute video of a former member of the European Parliament sharing the important role of young carers as social entrepreneurs will be uploaded on the website of the project. Partners will utilize social media extensively (eg Facebook, Twitter, Instagram) to reach a wide young audience.
Facebook Page https://bit.ly/2UNd7qY
Webpage https://sesycare.eu/?lang=en
Link to project card https://bit.ly/3lQvTtz
Social Entrepreneurship Skills for Young CAREgivers of people with chronic Illness – SESYCARE virtual kick-off meeting
The kick-off meeting of the Erasmus+ SESYCARE project took place on 18.12.2020. Due to the pandemic we couldn’t meet in person, but nevertheless the online meeting went very well. It was indeed very productive and the project partners went through all the project’s details and planned the next steps to fulfil all its goals as effectively as possible.
The meeting commenced with a workshop on social entrepreneurship and young caregivers.
The theme of social entrepreneurship, the vulnerable team of young carers, the Erasmus For Young Entrepreneurs program and the British Council Life Skills program, on how to develop social entrepreneurs were developed. An interesting presentation was made by the Italian partner EUROSUD on the contribution of volunteers to the development of organizations.
We continued by introducing the members of the project consortium, who then presented their organizations from the perspective of their daily agenda, implemented projects, and staff.
The presentation was followed by a detailed description of the project – its objectives, milestones, the learning activity in the Netherlands, and impact.
We discussed and brainstormed mainly about the project timeline, deadlines, and tasks division regarding upcoming outcomes to be developed. It will be the SESYCARE website (www.sesycare.eu) that will provide a space for networking, learning, and sharing good practices for young caregivers who want to become social entrepreneurs. The second output is the Good practice guide that will help youth workers to figure out how to promote social entrepreneurship to young caregivers. We will also organise relevant webinars in Greek and English and the content will be uploaded on YouTube. Finally, policymakers (such as members of the European Parliament) will also share their message on the important role of young carers in the sustainability of health systems in Europe. 
At the end of the meeting, we discussed our plans and proposals for the dissemination of the project, its sustainability and, above all, we agreed on effective project management and its tools, which we will use together throughout the project.We are very much looking forward to our cooperation and believe that our project will contribute to streamlining social entrepreneurship for young caregivers in Europe.
The project, currently in its first phase, is delivered in partnership with eleven partners, namely EPIONI, Anemos Ananeosis, AKEP, IED, Saronic Nephrological Center and University of West Attica (Greece); Consorzio SGS and EUROSUD (Italy); DFW2W (The Netherlands), Istanbul Gelisim University (Turkey), Eurocarers (Belgium).
In the context of the kick-off meeting two webinars (One in Greek and one in English) for social entrepreneurship and young caregivers were conducted. Both are available at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
During the next 23 months, SESYCARE will focus on offering skills and information about EU funded opportunities or training for young people who wish to develop their social entrepreneurship.
EPIONI and Anemos Ananeosis organized in 18.9.2020 an Online seminar on Social Entrepreneurship.
1) the Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs program,
2) the British Council Life Skills program, developing social entrepreneurs,
3) the social cooperative Diaplous,
4) the legal framework
5) The contribution of higher education to social entrepreneurship
We would like to acknowledge the valuable support of INEDIVIM and the Erasmus+ programme of the EU
