By Katherine Milligan
Non-profits and civil liberties groups reported a surge of donations last month. Why? Because these organizations could be under threat during the new U.S. administration, Forbes reported. But if you want to make a philanthropic donation to an organization serving vulnerable Americans – either in your name or in the name of a loved one as a holiday gift – you could also consider social enterprises.
Social entrepreneurs create new ways to solve old social problems. They experiment with business models, innovate new distribution and replication methods, and hold themselves accountable for results. Since creating the greatest impact for the most number of people requires leveraging market forces and business practices wherever possible, social entrepreneurs have broken free of the false dichotomy between “it’s a business” or “it’s a charity” to keep their social mission front and center, even as they focus on results just as any commercial enterprise would.
Below are some social enterprises that have received multiple national and international awards and recognitions for their work. From these organizations, two strong themes emerge. Firstly, they have created partnerships with the private sector. First Book works with more than 90 publishing companies that offer steep discounts to classrooms serving children in need. Encore.org works with large companies like Intel to place their retiring workers into Encore Fellowships. And the country’s four biggest wireless carriers all feel Crisis Text Line is such an important service that they’ve waved their text messaging charges to its hotline.
Secondly, many of these social enterprises help Americans strengthen their “empathy muscle”—something the whole of society feels in dire need of at the moment. They do this by building bridges across segments of society that otherwise would probably not come into contact, like college students helping low-income families, and retirees volunteering with youth groups
1. Community Solutions, based in New York, launched a national movement, the 100,000 Homes Campaign, four years ago in partnership with city and state officials in dozens of cities, housing more than 105,580 homeless Americans during that period. Building on that success, their new campaign, Built for Zero, will coordinate a national movement with U.S. mayors and city officials to end chronic and veteran homelessness for good. The first step in Community Solution’s methodology is a census. Volunteers strike up a conversation with every homeless person they can track down, noting down their name and medical history. It’s a critical step, because it gives homelessness a face. Everyone affected has a name, and a story, and hopes and dreams, just like all of us.
2. College Summit has developed a proven methodology to get more kids in low-income schools to apply to college and stay in college. Recognizing the strong peer influence teenagers have on each other, College Summit maps the social networks in all 200+ schools where they work and selects the influencers to attend a residential camp where they receive leadership training and complete college applications. Those students then motivate their high school friends to do the same. President Obama was so impressed with College Summit’s model he donated part of his Nobel Prize to support their work.
3. Health Leads connects patients to services and resources as part of their regular doctor's visits. Community health workers, case managers and/or student volunteers screen patients for unmet needs and help them access any of the 50 basic resource needs relevant for their circumstances, such as food assistance, childcare vouchers, enrolment in a GED program – even negotiating with the utilities company to get their heat turned back on. Health Leads works with clinics and health systems across the U.S., including Kaiser Permanente, Massachusetts General Hospital, NYC Health + Hospitals, and Dayton Children's Hospital – and they are supporting policymakers to adopt social needs interventions more broadly.
4. Encore.org is transforming the challenge of an ageing society into an opportunity by enabling midlife Americans and retirees to remain productive members of society. They do this by creating pathways for those over 50 to have a second act – or “encore career” - directed towards our greatest social and environmental challenges, often by serving in volunteer or remunerated positions in schools and non-profit organizations.
5. First Book has harnessed the power of aggregation to provide high-quality books and other educational materials at a dramatic cost-savings to educators and program serving children in need. The First Book Marketplace counts more than 280,000 classrooms and schools as members, who collectively serve more than 5 million American children in need. By buying large quantities of books from publishers on a non-returnable basis, First Book can secure more than a 70% discount on the retail price on average – which means they get a new book into the hands of a low-income child for $2.50, including shipping.
6. Do you want to support mental health services for teens and youth in crisis? Crisis Text Line is a secure text message platform available any time of day or night. While it’s open to anyone, about 80% of those texting their hotline, 741741, are under the age of 25. Trained counselors respond to texts from those experiencing a crisis, such as abuse, self-harm, depression or suicidal thoughts, and provide supportive coaching and referrals depending on each situation. Thanks to partnerships with AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon, any person using those carriers can access the text service free of charge.
Katherine Milligan is the head of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship.
