The European Commission’s Social Innovation Competition 2016,  ‘Integrated Futures’, focuses on innovative solutions for refugees and brings together social entrepreneurs, changemakers and technologists from different European countries. REFUNITE has been selected as a Jury member, alongside organizations, such as The United Nations Refugee Agency and TechFugees.

REFUNITE shares expertise at European Social Innovation Academy 2016

The first week of July 2016 saw Director of Global Communication and Strategy Ida Jeng sharing REFUNITE’s expertise at the European Social Innovation Academy in Berlin, Germany. The Social Innovation Academy took place from 3-6 July, providing a unique chance for the 30 semi-finalists of the European Social Innovation Competition 2016 to connect and learn from leading experts in the field, and to collaborate with peers and other social innovators. As part of the Academy programme, Ida Jeng led two sessions on how to effectively scale ideas, and discussed key insights and lessons learned from her experience at REFUNITE.

The Academy it is one of the milestones in the European Social Innovation Competition, which is organized by the European Commission, the BMW Foundation, the Allianz Stiftungsforum and other partners. This year, the Competition focuses on the idea of “Integrated Futures,” aimed at finding the best initiatives to support refugees in Europe and to build more inclusive societies. In less than two months, over 1,000 innovative projects addressing the refugee crisis were submitted. From these, 30 were short-listed to participate in the Academy to be further developed and refined through workshops such as those led by Ida.  The 30 semi-finalists now have until September to submit their reviewed ideas before the Jury will announce the three finalists in  late October 2016, who will each receive €50,000 to implement their project.

15th July 2016.