Mom Incubators
Preventing premature infant deaths in refugee camps
After watching a documentary on preventable infant deaths among Syrian refugees, James Roberts created the MOM incubator as part of his design engineering course at Loughborough University. The electronically controlled, inflatable incubator is energy efficient, lightweight and costs less than 5% of the price of a conventional incubator. The design was awarded the 2014 James Dyson award for innovation.
Change Please
Coffee against homelessness
This not-for-profit social enterprise trains rough sleepers to be baristas in mobile coffee vans. With the support of the Big Issue and Cemal Ezel, co-founder of Peckham’s Old Spike Roastery, the programme provides each barista with housing, training and a London living wage, as well as full-time employment after six months.
Techfugees
Tech solutions to help refugees
Volunteers from the tech world are helping refugees with a series of not-for-profit conferences, workshops and hackathons. As one of the instigators, Mike Butcher, has said: “We’re not saying tech is a magic wand... but it’s 2015, not 1939, and smartphones and the web have the capability to find lost families, report human rights abuses and perhaps even disrupt the smugglers.”
Jess Thom
Her Touretteshero website works for comedy – and greater understanding
Thom is an artist and activist with Tourette’s syndrome, who co-founded and leads the project Touretteshero. The website encourages people to engage creatively with the humour of Tourette’s while gaining awareness of the frequently misunderstood syndrome. A blog describes many aspects of life with the condition, while users can view a list of Thom’s tics and offer artistic responses. The Touretteshero project also raises funds through merchandise and donations in order to fund events for young people with Tourette’s. The judges called Thom “a radical and beautiful person”.
Makerversity
Workspace and support for creative businesses
This project, based in London’s Somerset House and a new hub in Amsterdam, aims to encourage the next generation of creative businesses by providing shared workspace at a subsidised rate. Members have access to workshops and equipment and are also offered events and teaching from other faculty members.
Provenance
Ethical sourcing consultancy
Founded by tech designer Jessi Baker, Provenance helps businesses increase sales, and customer loyalty, by encouraging greater transparency. Using blockchain data-security technology, it shows whether a product is authentic, organic or made with respect for workers’ rights etc.
Refuweegee
A wee welcome for refugees in Glasgow
This community group provides refugees in Glasgow with welcome packs containing essentials such as blankets, toiletries, letters of welcome from residents and traditional Scottish items. Glaswegian locals are known as weegies, hence refuweegee was coined to describe a refugee embraced by the Glaswegian community.
Selina Hales founded the project in 2015 in the face of the worsening migrant crisis, to make newcomers feel at home in her city. According to one judge: “People in Glasgow basically believe that refugees are a part of its community. I instantly connected and fell in love with the refuweegee idea.”
Lemn Sissay’s Christmas Dinner
Festive meals for young care leavers
This inspirational initiative, founded by poet, chancellor of Manchester University and care leaver Lemn Sissay MBE, provides a Christmas Day lunch for care leavers between 16 and 30, funded by public pledges. The first Christmas Dinner took place in Manchester in 2013, and now includes Leeds and London. Organised by volunteers, its aim is “no care leaver alone on Christmas Day”. The judges said: “It just feels like a really beautiful project.”
Lingo Flamingo
Fighting dementia with language learning
This Glaswegian social enterprise offers foreign language workshops to vulnerable adults, particularly those in care homes or suffering from dementia. Created and led by Robbie Norval, the project is based on scientific evidence that the knowledge and study of foreign languages can delay the onset of dementia.
Mark Swift
Social innovator in the health sector
Mark Swift is the founder of Wellbeing Enterprises CIC (community interest company) in Runcorn, Cheshire, the first health and wellbeing CIC in the UK. He aims to improve patient outcomes and reduce demand on care services through “social prescribing”, tackling inequalities and promoting wellbeing.
Abi Ramanan
Young activist with food focus
Abi Ramanan has founded two food family-run social enterprises in London: Papi’s Pickles, which provides fresh south Indian and Sri Lankan food for events, pop-ups and street food markets, while working with unemployed women from those communities, and DayOld, a food surplus box scheme that tackles food waste and poverty. Last year, she participated in Singularity University’s global solutions programme at the Nasa research park, and she is co-founder of ImpactVision, a tech firm that uses hyperspectral analytics to improve the food system.
@LauraCoryton
Fighting to end tax on tampons
As a student, Coryton started a Change.org petition demanding that feminine hygiene products be tax-exempt. The campaign, which secured more than 320,000 signatures, pressured George Osborne into debating the tax in his budget announcement and led to cuts in the price of tampons across the UK.
Michael Sani
Positive politics for the next generation
Inspired by Rock the Vote in the US, Mike Sani founded Bite the Ballot to tackle political apathy among the young. In 2012 it ran the UK’s first youth-voter registration rally, and in 2013 championed policies important to 16-25-year-olds. During one week last year its national drive saw almost half a million register to vote.
Gortilea Social Farm
Social farming project
The farm is changing the lives of people living with disabilities and mental illness in Northern Ireland by teaching them to care for animals, learn gardening and countryside management and help with farmwork. Through stimulating activities and practical skills, and a belief in the positive impact of a countryside environment, the farm encourages independence and improved wellbeing. It is also currently the only hippotherapy (equine therapy) centre in Northern Ireland.
Founders Pledge
Technology and altruism
Set up by Founders Forum for Good, the scheme encourages entrepreneurs to donate 2% of their personal proceeds to charity when they sell their business. CEO David Goldberg says: “It’s a tax-efficient way to do good in the world without taking time and effort away from investors’ own projects.”
Granby Four Streets CLT
Improving a rundown neighbourhood
The Granby Four Streets in Liverpool were built in the 1890s. By the 1980s they were derelict. For more than 20 years, locals who set up a community land trust have cleared, planted, painted and campaigned to reclaim their streets. Architects Assemble won the 2015 Turner prize for their work with the campaign.
Beat the Street
Making physical activity everyday fun
A new initiative from Intelligent Health, led by GP Dr William Bird MBE, which campaigns to increase physical activity and improve the health of communities, Beat the Street turns towns into games - where people earn points as they walk, cycle and run – and thereby increases the health of the population.
Sarah Gold
Designer, thinker, innovator
The London-based designer works on the ethical issues of technology and the internet. Founder of Projects by IF, a design studio that makes things to change how people think about data, privacy and security. Gold also co-founded the not-for-profit WikiHouse Foundation and pioneered the Alternet, a proposal for a civic network.
Sue Malson
Charity shop supports local community
Sue Malson is manager and community co-ordinator for Trac2, a charity based in Trevethin, Pontypool. It provides low-cost services throughout the borough, investing back into the local area. The charity operates from a shop that sells a range of products at low prices and donates supplies to members of the community in need.
Alcove
Using technology to revolutionise care of the vulnerable
This digital social care service uses data to promote independent living and revolutionise care for older and disabled adults in London. The startup uses the internet of things to power a “telecare” system that uses real-time data from wireless sensors and wearable technology, such as a smartwatch that works as a panic alarm. Users can reassure themselves by checking older family members online, while the system can also help healthcare providers and support workers develop better patient care. The judges called Alcove “a really simple concept” that can prevent deaths by identifying problems quickly.
Owen Winter
Teenage campaigner for electoral reform
Winter, 17, started an online petition to end the British “first past the post” voting system. The petition received more than 200,000 signatures, and he became spokesperson of the Make Votes Matter movement, as well as a council member for the Electoral Reform Society.
Open Up Music
Empowering young disabled musicians
Co-founded by Barry Farrimond and Doug Bott, this charity uses innovative teaching methods to encourage young disabled musicians to form orchestras and challenge stereotypes while developing new music. It also designs affordable musical instruments that can be played with any part of the body, including the eyes.
Wayfindr
Non-visual navigation
This audio-based navigation tool helps the visually impaired to travel independently and is the result of a collaboration between the RLSB Youth Forum and ustwo (a digital studio). The system had a trial installation in London’s Euston Station. The judges called it “scalable, sustainable and collaborative”.
Worthwhile
Placing graduates in the not-for-profit sector
By training and placing graduates in partner not-for-profit organisations, this scheme helps both charities and people who want a socially useful career. It also offers them housing support and a living wage, freeing them from unpaid internships. It’s part of Hub Ventures, a family of UK charities and social businesses.
My Living Will
End-of-life choices website
The website lets users express their wishes and preferences for care and provides information on the options and legal issues involved. The project is overseen by healthcare professionals, lawyers and ethicists and is currently hosted by the charity Centre for Innovation in Voluntary Action (CIVA).
The Book Reserve
Supporting young parents in Belfast
This startup offers employment to young, vulnerable parents via its two businesses: The Thinking Cup Cafe and an online secondhand bookshop. The project trains parents, particularly young offenders, to help reintegrate them and to create a business model that can support them in the future.
Big Local
Two villages get big funding
Goldthorpe and Bolton-on-Dearn are neighbouring villages in Barnsley, ex-mining areas with small but relatively young populations. In 2013, they received £1m from the lottery’s Big Local programme: projects funded include turning empty properties into affordable housing, protecting the local environment and improving job options for the young.
Engineering for People Design Challenge
Ethical engineers
Started by Engineers Without Borders UK in 2011, this project asks its participants to design creative solutions to real-world problems. Geared towards creating a new generation of ethically minded and globally responsible engineers, iIt is now part of the engineering syllabus in 27 universities in the UK and is taught across the globe in Australia, New Zealand and Malaysia. In previous years the challenge has contributed ideas to support communities in India, Cambodia, rural Australia, Timor-Leste and Vietnam.
WEvolution
Collaboration in deprived communities
A Scottish movement that encourages mutual support by connecting small groups of people from disadvantaged backgrounds. Inspired by the women’s self-help movement in India, these Self-Reliant Groups typically involve five to 10 women who save money together each week, learn new skills and start businesses.
Shane Ryan
Leading figure in charities for men
The British writer, reformer and social activist Shane Ryan has more than 25 years’ experience of working with underprivileged or vulnerable young males and is a frequent speaker on male-related social issues. In 2009, he was appointed chief executive of the award-winning UK charity Working With Men.
Aparito
Wearable technology to improve patient care
Via a special wristband and phone app, Aparito aims to improve care by monitoring patients remotely. Developed by former paediatric nurse Dr Elin Haf Davies, the wristband records data related to the patient’s wellbeing outside of brief hospital assessments, and the app sends the findings to a database where clinical staff can review it in real time.
Beautiful Information
Better NHS patient care via data presentation
The first NHS-private partnership of its kind, it aims to improve patient care by presenting complex hospital and health data in simple, comprehensible ways using phone apps. This real-time information helps NHS trusts plan clinical services, improve data quality and meet changes in patient needs more quickly.
MOMO
Pioneering a change in children’s social work
Mind of My Own is a free and confidential app designed to help young people become more involved in the decisions of their social care team. It allows young people to make contributions to their reviews and conferences, prepare for meetings, express their wishes and feelings to the correct authorities and encourages a sense of empowerment.
USDL
Better British politics in a digital age
“We don’t want smart cities that pit citizens against algorithms,” says Urban Sustainable Development Lab. Last year, it worked with the elderly in Leeds to try to make their city better to grow old in. The project improves communities’ wellbeing by combining a smart city approach with a focus on residents.
Democracy Club
Better British politics in a digital age
This non-partisan club aims to improve the process of democracy in the digital age through services such as election registers, public datasets and leaflet archiving. Founded in 2010 with 7,000 volunteers, it became a CIC in 2015 and receives project-based funding from Google.org and the Rowntree Trust.
Sentimoto
Smartwatches to help care for the elderly
Inspired by the principles of apps such as FitBit and Jawbone, Sentimoto employs wearable technology to monitor older people’s wellbeing and physical activity, relayingthe information back to their carers in a secure and easy way. More generally, the founders aspire to use this data to improve understanding of the impact lifestyle has on older people’s health. With an ageing population and adult care expenditure reaching £8.9bn in 2012/13, Sentimoto hopes to revolutionise the management of care in the UK.
Chayn
Combating domestic violence globally
Founded by Hera Hussain after she had helped a friend escape an abusive marriage, Chayn is a platform designed to empower and inform victims of domestic violence globally. Powered entirely by volunteers, the project website harnesses technology to offer information including crowdsourced articles and online toolkits, eg how to build a domestic abuse case without a lawyer, plus a stalking and harassment guide for college students. Chayn’s next project involves counselling Indian teens via SnapChat.
Growing Support
Gardening in elderly care communities
This award-winning social enterprise helps older people living in care turn underused gardens into hubs of activity and sociable growing spaces. Featuring weekly gardening clubs that encourage them to work together and grow their own food, this not-for-profit community interest company (CIC) offers stimulation, exercise, and social interaction, tackling loneliness and inactivity while improving health and quality of life.
Help Refugees
A fast response to the refugee crisis
Last year, following a plan to take a truck of supplies to Calais, three British women were inspired to launch the #helpcalais initiative to collect funds and clothes. The charity is now one of the primary organisations helping with the refugee crisis, and sends assistance such as food and medical aid all over Europe.
Create Streets
Better streets for the community
Create Streets is a “social enterprise and research institute encouraging more urban homes with terraced streets, not complex multistorey buildings”. Last year, for instance, it worked with residents in the Mount Pleasant area of north London on an alternative proposal for developing a controversial site.
