Changing lives and tackling stubborn social issues was the order of the day at the 'Better Place' graduation of Hampshire School for Social Entrepreneurs (HSSE) this year.It seems that it's not just charities that are making Hampshire a better place to live.
Nine new Fellows join the growing list of social entrepreneurs who are addressing social and environmental issues close to their hearts and making a business out of it, and over 100 people attended Wednesday's event put on by Community Action Hampshire (CAH) who have led this vital support into this fourth year.
Steve Brine, MP for Winchester and Chandlers Ford, attended and was inspired by these local people wanting to make a difference. Speaking afterwards, he said: "It was a real pleasure to be able to come along tonight and see so many inspiring people from across Hampshire graduating here in Winchester. This school is really making a difference and what is positive above almost anything, it is creating social entrepreneurs who will run stand-alone social enterprises and not ones reliant on constant public funding to remain in existence. They are small business but they're the big society with bells on."
Amongst those graduating were Catherine Waters-Clark from Basingstoke whose business Inspiro runs a project enabling disaffected young people to find joy in the simple pleasures of growing fruit and vegetables. Catherine recalled memories of her rural childhood and is concerned that that today's young people miss the connection of food and nature and provides a fun and safe place for them to discover this.
Nick Hudson from Plentifuel, another successful HSSE Fellow, said; "I get excited about business that meets a real need"
Nick is developing a business that will provide subsidised wood burning boilers to people from rural Hampshire. He is motivated by reducing the amount of wood waste that we export abroad that could so easily be used to heat our homes.
Conroy Williams, Programme Manager for the course, said: "We have 16 new social entrepreneurs starting our next programme at the end of this month.These were selected from a pool of over 60 applicants who require support to get their social business off the ground.
"CAH are open to investment from like minded individuals and organisations to be able to continue this provision over the coming years."
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