Education ventures dominate list of top 100 social enterprises

Of the 100 social enterprises listed in the NT100, published today, 45 tackle educational issues and six of these, including Raspberry Pi, are based in the UK. The NT100, published today by Nominet Trust, a UK registered charity which supports digital technology with a social and economic value, has listed 45 ventures that have an educational focus. The global list highlights original uses of technology and celebrates the people behind the ventures, who are using this technology to tackle social challenges. Charles Leadbeater, author and leading authority on innovation, led a steering group who compiled the list. They selected the final 100 technology based social enterprises from a list of nominations from across the globe, made by members of the public and people in the field. Of the 45 educational social enterprises listed in the NT100, 6 are UK based ventures, including BBC Janala, a learning programme supported by English in Action, which offers English language tuition to the people of Bangladesh, through three minute lessons and quizzes sent to learners’ mobiles. Also on the list is; History Pin, a website that allows people from across the globe to share videos and images from the past with the aim of building an archive of social history; Raspberry Pi, a credit card sized computer that encourages users to learn coding; and Young Rewired State, an independent global network who organise events for children aged 18 and under who have taught themselves to code. TES, a global network of teachers sharing resources, is also on the list of UK based social enterprises, as is Zooniverse, which is home to the internet’s largest citizen science projects. Annika Small, CEO of Nominet Trust, said that social entrepreneurs are continuing to find ways to open up access to education. “Digital technology has already transformed how we communicate, how we work, how we buy and sell. But we are only just beginning to scratch the surface of ways that technology can be used to transform how we address complex social challenges including those around education.” The NT100 will form the foundation of an online resource for social enterprises called “The Social Tech Guide”, which is intended to be a global public database of social tech innovators from around the world. Charles Leadbeater said: “The NT100 highlights how digital technologies can make a real difference to some of the most pressing social challenges we face. “We want to offer the NT100 as a public source of information, searchable by anyone seeking a solution to a social challenge.” Source: Education News