16. 04. 2021
The Student Council of the ISSBS successfully held the 11th student conference on social entrepreneurship, intergenerational cooperation and volunteering, which was held in a virtual environment for the second year in a row.
From the links below you can access the guests’ videos, presentations and useful links:
– Power of education and helping Roma people to school (Mrs. Sibel Bajram, Master of Arts in Human Resource Management, Association for Roma Women Development, North Macedonia)
Video presentation (download)
– Volunteering and Culture mediators (Dr. Augusto Sebastio, CSIG Taranto, Italy)
Video presentation (download)
Useful links: Cultural Mediator, Cultural Mediator – Aid job, National geografic on migrations and also cultural mediators
– Intergeneration Challenge – A Post-COVID Outlook (Dr. Mohamed Jasim Buheji, International institute of Inspirational Economy, Bahrain)
Video presentation (download)
Useful link: Untapped Solutions’ that present Social Entrep & Volunteering Opportunities in the Future
– Prostovoljstvo kot priložnost za mlade (Dr. Barbara Lužar, NGO – Hiša sadeži družbe Žalec)
Video presentation (download)
Useful link: Community center Hiša Žalec v oddaji U3nek z Mojco Mavec
– Involvement of Volunteers in Youth centre Celje (mag. Katja Kolenc, Celjski mladinski center)
Video presentation (download)
Useful links: 14th Volunteering Festival, MCC presentation
– Social responsibility as a value of modern societies and two cases: (1) Slovenia – ISSBS and students’ involvement and (2) Egypt – social responsibility and entrepreneurial opportunities (Dr. Valerij Dermol, ISSBS & Mrs. Rania Salah Seddik, GebRaa, Egypt)
Video presentation (download)
– Career centre at ISSBS (Tjaša Tavčar)
Video presentation (download)
– Help is the foundation of interpersonal relationships (Mr. Nino Batagelj, paraglider, paradancer, entrepreneur, volunteer)
Video presentation (download)
– From volunteering to employment (Mrs. Bojana Centrih, assistant educator in kindergarten)
Video presentation (download)
The organizational threads of the conference were once again in the hands of the extremely active Student Council of the ISSBS, in which they emphasized the need to cooperate and connect generations in the current social situation, build good human relations and maintain solidarity, and focus on intergenerational cooperation. The knowledge and abilities of the elderly are an important part of human and social capital, so it is very important for social development that the achievements of previous generations are passed on to younger generations. However, this alone is not enough, as social responsibility, the development of a stable economic environment and the development of general well-being in society are once again becoming values that are coming to the fore. Ethical and moral action in the interest of the people and not the pursuit of profit are the foundations of social entrepreneurship.
The main idea of the conference is to present to students and young people the opportunities, including employment, that can await them in the framework of non-governmental organizations, volunteering and social entrepreneurship. We wanted to show them examples of good practice from the local environment, as well as from abroad, and provide useful first-hand information from the leaders of the organizations, as well as the volunteers themselves. At the same time, we presented the ISSBS as committed to social responsibility to the international participants of the conference, to which they responded in large numbers. There were as many as 93 participants, of which 40 were from other countries. The conference was conducted in English, which is confirmed by the international activities of the faculty, ” summed up the president of the Student Council of the ISSBS Jernej Lipičnik.
The importance of promoting volunteering and solidarity among young people, intergenerational cooperation between volunteers and mutual learning between them and organizations was discussed by Mag. Katja Kolenc from the Celje Youth Center. She emphasized the importance of connection and cooperation of local organizations, which include volunteers in their activities, as well as efforts for joint design of projects and activities for the needs of the local environment or population. The guest of the conference also presented the voluntary projects of the Celje Youth Center and the Europe Direct Savinjska Information Point.
On social responsibility and the experience of the ISSBS with volunteering, Assoc. prof. dr. Valerij Dermol, an expert with experience in the field of education, consulting, management in the economy and higher education in Slovenia and abroad. As he said, the ISSBS has the concept of social responsibility defined in the vision of the faculty, and social responsibility can be understood from the values of the faculty, which include responsibility and honesty towards users. In the light of social responsibility, the ISSBS also developed the course Social Responsibility and Volunteering, in which students participate as volunteers and present their volunteering activities.
Social entrepreneurship was presented at the conference by the founder of the social enterprise GebRaa from Egypt, Mrs. Rania Salah Seddik. As part of the company, it works with more than 300 artisans from all over Egypt and creates new jobs, including for people with disabilities, rural communities and women’s communities. As a social entrepreneur, she says that her life goal is to create decent jobs and to penetrate foreign markets with new handicraft products and increase the offer by creating new generations of craftsmen.
The founder of the International Institute for Inspirational Economics in Bahrain, dr. Mohamed Jasim Buheji has in the presentation entitled Intergenerational Challenge – Perspective after COVID, wondered how to use and enrich t. i. “Untapped solutions” within the COVID-19 pandemic. The focus of the presentation was on the intergenerational gap as an idea for social entrepreneurship and volunteering projects. Dr. Buheji believes that young people today need such projects more than ever, even more than the older generations, as many forms of knowledge, information and experience between generations are lost precisely because of the gap between generations.
Among the guests from abroad was also mag. Sibel Bajram, who is also the winner of the award in the field of advocacy for the empowerment of Roma girls and women and an English teacher in primary school in one of the largest Roma municipalities in Europe. She acquainted the participants with the programs, initiatives and laws of Northern Macedonia, which relate to helping Roma of all generations in schooling and education. She highlighted the 2014-2015 law, which defined primary and secondary education as compulsory for every child, regardless of their citizenship. Scholarships for Roma first-graders from families dependent on the state social security program or whose parents are unemployed have also been awarded in Northern Macedonia for two years with the help of the Roma Education Fund.