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Jon Egging Trust (JET) believe that every young person should have access to the same quality of opportunities and leave school with the confidence, resilience, and self-belief to succeed and fulfil their potential. With this objective in view, JET offers long-term support to young people from vulnerable backgrounds who are likely to struggle to engage at school. JET delivers outreach programmes named Blue Skies (Level 1,2,3) and Inspirational Outreach (bespoke impact days) to young people to raise their aspirations and empower them. The programmes are delivered with a range of partners, including the RAF (Scampton, Odiham, Wittering, Waddington, Brize, Coningsby, Marham, Valley, Honington, and Cranwell), NATs, Northrop Grumman, BAE Systems, Microsoft, QinetiQ, Boeing, Rolls Royce, and Ascent(see Appendix E for a full list of partners). JET’s provision is unique nationally in the breadth and scope of its work which complements the school curriculum. Indeed, the research team is not aware of another third sector organisation that provides such in-depth support within schools at the secondary education level; this means that JET has a Unique Selling Point through its work to support young people. The evaluation of JET’s Youth Programme has been undertaken by the Institute for Social Innovation and Impact (ISII) at the University of Northampton. This report presents the full evaluation of the JET Youth Programme and includes a literature review; methods; data collection and analysis; limitations; and recommendations sections. The data showcases data collected between April 2021 and January 2022, including qualitative data (semi-structured interviews, and the implementation of Photostories), and quantitative data (the ISII questionnaire and data from JET). Overall, the ISII’s evaluation indicates that JET activities provide students with the feeling of being confident and empowered. Participating in initiatives such as those delivered by JET contributes to young people’s self-esteem and empowerment, as the initiatives build young people’s confidence. It strengthens relationships with the people around them and their organisations and helps young people in their education and personal development.

Social enterprises address social and environmental problems by developing innovative solutions to improve communities, societies and the lives of individuals. The meaning of social enterprise is fluid, with Teasdale (2012:100) arguing that social enterprise is “politically, culturally, historically and geographically variable”. The British Council’s global social enterprise programme draws on the UK experience in social enterprise and the Council’s work across the world to promote its growth around the world. This research investigates the social enterprise landscape in Mexico, specifically to explore how Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) utilise their resources and expertise to develop social enterprise ecosystems. Thomson Reuters Foundation (2019) research on the “Best Country to be a Social Entrepreneur” ranked Mexico last (43rd), a drop of 15 places from its 2016 position of 28th overall . This drop was based on worsening conditions for accessing non-financial business support (a key area that HEIs can assist with), as well as deteriorating sales to the public. However, Mexico does perform well in the involvement of youth in social enterprise, ranking 9th in this area and illustrating how universities’ key resource (i.e. students) could be utilised to support growth. Thus, understanding the social enterprise ecosystem in Mexico, and the role of HEIs, creates an opportunity for promoting social entrepreneurship and social innovation in Mexico and improving the ecosystem opportunities in the country. This research seeks to analyse the status of integration between Mexican Higher Education Institutions and the wider social enterprise ecosystem, exploring current challenges and opportunities from the academic, institutional and system level perspective. The core objectives of the research are: •To update on the status of HEIs contributions to Social Enterprise initiatives in Mexico, as well as their participation on international and multinational collaborations. •To identify HE institutional / HE-system policy innovations designed to open spaces for Universities or Research Centres to integrate SE as a strategy to engage with non-HE communities. •To determine how HEIs are prioritizing financial, technical, physical, and human resources, as well as networks, knowledge, and expertise to consolidate their participation in SE related programmes and activities. •To analyse HEIs best practices on assessing the impact of SE activity, from the academic perspective (students, staff) and from the external community engagement perspective. •To identify relevant challenges for HEIs to actively participate in the promotion of social value, with a focus on SE from an institutional perspective.

I am delighted to write this foreword outlining the University of Northampton’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The University’s mission is transforming lives + inspiring change and I cannot see better examples showing this than the way in which students and staff have come together to support themselves and the local and regional community during this extraordinary time. The relocation from our two former campuses to Waterside Campus in 2018 and the associated changes to our teaching and learning model, our ways of working and our physical assets have been key to our positive, socially innovative retort to the Covid-19 challenge. Take for example the way in which our students have selflessly joined the frontline in healthcare settings to support the NHS, effectively adapted to their teaching being delivered online via our virtual learning environment or how we have collaborated with local businesses and other partners to support them with the challenges they have faced. Many of the activities we have supported, and their social impact, will continue to resonate long after the pandemic has subsided and help further cement the University as an anchor institution in Northampton and the wider County. Professor Nick Petford DSc Vice Chancellor and CEO

Social innovation has seen rapid growth in the last decade globally, with increasing numbers of social innovators developing new ideas, the emergence of government policy to support social innovation, and enhanced interest in the concept and practice by academics. Universities play a key role in developing responses to complex problems and social innovation is seen to offer critical tools for them to achieve this. This research comprises a comparative study and five in-depth country reports on social innovation and social enterprise research and teaching in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Korea and Vietnam. It was conducted by the University of Northampton in partnership with local research teams in each country. It finds that social innovation is the subject of growing number of courses in these countries, with the vast majority of modules focused at the undergraduate level, and social innovation teaching seen as a critical element in students’ development, especially in fostering communication skills, empathy, problem-solving, and analytical thinking. However, it notes that one of the existing challenges is that social innovation modules remain dominated by business schools. Research into social innovation is also growing, and there is a desire for more research centred on business modelling, social enterprise success factors and social impact measurement. However, it notes that research collaborations in this field between Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are uncommon and that there is a lack of funding for social innovation research from HEIs. The authors make a number of recommendations in the comparative study at the practice, institutional and systemic levels. They suggest, for instance, that social innovation should be embedded across all academic disciplines and degree programmes and that HEIs increase their engagement with corporates for support of social innovation research and teaching.

This is the third interim annual report from a four-year longitudinal study of the social impact resulting from the Ministry of Defence’s expenditure on cadets. It presents the findings of the University of Northampton’s research team and is based on new data gathered and analysed since the second interim report of autumn 2018. Where relevant it builds on the findings of the first two interim reports. It is based on a cumulative total of over 600 in-depth interviews and over 5,400 responses to questionnaires. The key themes covered by this report relate to the impact of a CCF unit on academy schools; the effect of participation in the Cadet Forces on the wellbeing of young people; the impact on community cohesion that the Cadet Forces can have; how the development of self-efficacy through participation in the Cadet Forces is helping young people to be better citizens, while also reducing their levels of vulnerability; and the value of the adult volunteers that run the Cadet Forces, and the benefits they get from their volunteering. The report uses calculations from Government sources to estimate the potential financial value of some of these themes.

This is the fourth annual evaluation report for Big Potential Advanced (BPA), which looks at the last four years of operation until December 31st 2018. Back in 2015 when BPA was first launched, the funding programme offered grants to charities and social enterprises seeking business support to help them gain social investment or win contracts in excess of £500,000. From the original £10 million of BPA support for 137 organisations, 45 of those charities and social enterprises have since achieved £464 million of social investment and contracts. We hope that the experience of Big Potential shared in this, and other evaluations, helps to shape the development of future programmes so that they can apply the lessons we’ve learned and be more effective as a result.

‘Surveying the social innovation and higher education landscape in Hong Kong’ is a key report commissioned as part of the British Council’s Building Research Innovation for Community Knowledge and Sustainability (BRICKS) project. The objective of the BRICKS project, which is funded by the Hong Kong government’s Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Fund (SIE Fund), is to build capacity and foster collaboration on social innovation between HEIs, NGOs, social enterprises and other organisations working at the frontline of public service delivery in Hong Kong. This research directly relates to this aim, by seeking to explore the barriers and enablers of collaboration to achieve social innovation primarily within/between HEIs in Hong Kong, but also with NGOs and other stakeholders. The research, therefore, explores the following aim and sub-aims: Research Aim: to understand the knowledge, capacity and future ambitions of the Hong Kong academic community in relation to SI. How is this shaped by barriers and enablers at the following three levels? • Systemic level: cultural norms, traditions and incentive structures that mediate inter-HEI collaboration. • Institutional level: behaviours and attitudes of faculty and staff in HEIs towards collaboration. • Practice-level: frontline knowledge of how to collaborate in the delivery of social innovation initiatives. The research adopts a sequential mixed-method research approach to data collection, comprising five stages: an in-depth literature review, an online survey, semi-structured interviews, ecosystem mapping and data triangulation. The study is of particular importance, given that, to date, there is no baseline data in relation to social innovation in Hong Kong’s higher education sector.

This document represents an analysis of data collected as part of a research project exploring the sustainability of supply chains for different leather products and how this relates to the needs, wants and perceptions of consumers. The research has been carried out by the University of Northampton’s Institute for Social Innovation and Impact (ISII) supported by the University’s Institute for Creative Leather Technologies (ICLT), and the research aims and tools were developed in partnership with the United States Hide, Skin and Leather Association (USHSLA).

“Fostering the Growth of the Social Impact Business Sector in Viet Nam” (the “study”) is the largest study on the social impact business (SIB) sector in Viet Nam undertaken to date. Findings are taken from 492 survey responses, interviews with 62 individuals representing various stakeholder groups, through one-on-one interviews or focus groups, and three multi-stakeholder consultative workshops. The study provides an overview of the ecosystem and the current state of the SIB sector in Viet Nam, together with challenges and opportunities, to produce key recommendations to grow the sector. Practical guidance targeted at SIBs in growing their enterprise is also included to share the advices and insights taken from consultation with SIB sector leaders. The main objective of the study is to catalyse the development of business activities toward addressing pressing social and environmental challenges, and ultimately toward the achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)1. The study was conducted in the context where there is a need to map the SIB sector in Viet Nam, which is recognised as an invaluable driver for positive social and environmental change, in order to design interventions to support the Government of Viet Nam in achieving the SDGs by 2030. The study aims to apply a wider understanding of the SIB sector to map and understand the huge potential of the sector from across a varied spectrum of organisations and models, all connected by their mission to solve social or environmental issues. For the purposes of the study, SIBs are understood as “organisations that have both trading activities and a commitment to positively impacting society/environment as the two central tenets of their strategic operations. This balancing of their social/environmental aims with a commercial model allows them to sustainably solve social and environmental challenges.”. This sector may include non-profit organisations having commercial activities, legally registered Social Enterprises (SEs), cooperatives, inclusive businesses, social impact startups, and commercial enterprises for sustainable development. SIB in this study is therefore provided as a working definition, one that seeks to respond to the concerns and barriers facing business leaders who have integrated social missions into their business models, and hence foster further growth of the wider SIB sector in Viet Nam.

This is the second interim annual report from a four-year longitudinal study of the social impact resulting from the Ministry of Defence’s expenditure on cadets. The key themes covered by this report relate to Social Mobility and cadets’ attendance, behaviour, and attitude at school. The report includes the views of schools, Ofsted and Cadet Force Adult Volunteers (CFAVs) on the benefits of cadets. In addition, this report comments on findings on the value and contribution of adult volunteers, cadets’ health and wellbeing including special educational needs and disability, and the role which cadets can play in improving community cohesion. The report is based on data gathered from 202 in-depth interviews and 3,753 responses to questionnaires

This report represents the findings of the University of Northampton (UoN) in the context of research engaged in by The Confederation of National Associations of Tanners and Dressers of the European Community (COTANCE) and industriAll-Europe, carried out within the framework of an EU funded Social Dialogue project. The research seeks to explore the practices in reporting and communicating Health and Safety (H&S) risks along the leather value chain and how they are managed in tanneries. Although most responses originated in Europe, the research was also keen to acknowledge that leather is a ‘Global Value Chain’; the research therefore reflects practices that span beyond European borders and the implications from the findings and recommendations made have global resonance for the leather value chain.

Final evaluation report for the Big Issue Invest Corporate Social Venture Fund, which sought to provide early-stage finance for start-up and nascent social ventures, blended with mentoring and partnership support for corporate partners including Barclays and Experian. The report details the performance of the fund, including it's social impact.

The financial value of every aspect of social impact delivered by the four MOD-sponsored Cadet Forces is not possible to quantify exactly (future reports will improve the reporting of financial benefit). However, the evidence gathered for this interim report clearly demonstrates that the value of the social impact that Cadet Forces deliver is vastly greater than the annual cost of the Cadet Forces to the Defence budget. These benefits go across Government departments and are clearly relevant to Defence, Education, Social Services, HMRC and the Cabinet Office. Cadet Forces deliver impact that is directly relevant to the Prime Minister’s vision of a “shared society” and clearly contribute to increasing social mobility and decreasing social disadvantage. Specifically, the research to date has identified that: Cadet Forces are effective at supporting children that receive Free School Meals (FSM) to achieve their potential. The potential saving to the UK that the Cadet Forces make by supporting, encouraging and developing current cadets that are FSM children, is greater than twice the amount which MOD spends annually on cadets. A study carried out in Greater Manchester strongly indicates that children that have been excluded from school and who join cadets are statistically significantly more likely to have improved attendance and behaviour on their return to education. The savings to the education budget of these social impacts are potentially huge. The Cadet Forces have a significant impact on making communities more inclusive. It is clear that cadet detachments enable people to overcome disadvantages in a way that schools do not. For most people, Sea, Army and Air Cadets are the visible face of the Armed Forces in the Community. The activities that cadets and Cadet Force Adult Volunteers (CFAVs) carry out as they deliver military values, results in increased recognition and awareness of our Armed Forces and improved respect for veterans. The formal training provided by all Cadet Forces is highly regarded. There is a very strong belief that CVQO courses have great value for CFAVs. They are deemed particularly useful for those adult volunteers with few or no qualifications. The qualifications and awards that adult volunteers have gained are estimated as providing the current adult volunteers with potential lifetime earnings increase of £15.58 million. Many adult volunteers gain significant personal and social benefits from being involved with cadets. The Sea Cadet Corps, the Combined Cadet Force, the Army Cadet Force; and the Air Training Corps. This is based upon an analysis of 338 CFAVs who gained accredited qualifications of NVQ Level 2 or higher. This does not include the other 186,000 qualifications gained since 1965. See Section 4.4 in the Methodology Paper for more information. Serving soldiers that were cadets have: higher self-efficacy; are four times more likely to be a SNCO or officer than non-cadets; and serve at least six years longer on average than non- cadets. Furthermore, 94% of serving soldiers that were cadets said it had ‘positively’ helped their Army career, and 25% of them stated that being a cadet had been “very useful” to their career. Moreover, serving soldiers that were cadets reported that the main personality traits that had been developed by their experiences in the Army Cadet Force (ACF) or Combined Cadet Force (CCF) were leadership and self-discipline.The development of communication, confidence and leadership skills that all four Cadet Forces deliver, are valued by cadets, parents, educational organisations, and employers. This skills development underpins all of the social impact that the Cadet Forces deliver.

Big Potential Advanced was created to complement the breakthrough route of Big Potential. For charities or social enterprises looking to raise over £500,000 of investment or bid for a contract over £1 million the fund provides specific support that was not previously available. As we look at the evaluation of the first year of the fund there are a number of initial conclusions we can draw. First, we know now that there is demand for the fund. Although we only received 23 applications this accelerated throughout the year. So far this trend appears to be continuing in year two. Second, the geographical spread of applications is pretty similar to that of Big Potential Breakthrough. Despite the differences between the funds the greatest demand for each fund appears to be in the same areas. The big question that remains unanswered though is how successful the fund has been in helping charities and social enterprises raise investment or win contracts. Unfortunately, it is too early for us to have an answer to this question. Investment readiness projects take time and implementing improvements, raising investments or winning contracts can be long processes so the benefits are not immediately seen. Therefore, we are still waiting to see how successful the VCSEs who have been awarded grants have been in achieving their investment or contract goals. Both Big Lottery Fund and Social Investment Business are committed to improving how this fund works and this report contains some key recommendations on how this can be achieved. Social Investment Business has published their response to the recommendations and agreed an action plan with the Fund to implement them. We hope that during year two we will find out more about the demand for this fund as well as start to understand how effective the support has been in helping VCSEs raise investment and win contracts. We will continue to share our experience in order to inform the design of future programmes and better understand the most effective ways to help VCSEs scale up their social impact.

Richard Hazenberg and Kelly Hall from the University of Northampton and Allison Ogden-Newton, Chair of the Transition Institute, consider how a more nuanced discussion of where, and under what conditions mutualisation brings social and financial value would be helpful. In his conclusion, Paul Buddery suggests that, just as the Enterprise Solutions project has itself seen a range of solutions, including but not limited to mutualisation, so the future of spin-outs is likely to take a number of different forms. Employee led mutuals may grow but so too will collaborative models, joint ventures, asset transfers and in house trading companies. As the appetite for spin-outs increases and new providers move into delivery, important opportunities arise for reviewing the evidence. It is important to assess the extent to which social enterprises and mutuals will or will not be able to effectively involve service users and deliver more efficient, responsive and high quality services than the public sector.

As a progressive society, there is an expectation for young people to become the social leaders and innovators of tomorrow. Not only does this expectation imply an intergenerational ‘passing of the baton’ but also this scenario assumes that young people value social change and possess the self-efficacy that empowers them to ignite positive social change. Added to this is a fundamental assumption that social constructs will enable young people to work as change agents, rather than create hindrances. A complexity for higher education institutions is how to develop young people’s capacities for social change given the inevitable variance in how much their students value and believe they have the ability for ‘changemaking’. \ud \ud This study explored university students’ conceptions of social change and their perspectives on the tools and resources needed to engage in social changemaking. Two focus groups were held at the University of Northampton, which elicited students’ (n=10) views on 1) their conceptions of social change and social innovation, 2) their perceptions of what enables young people to engage with social change and 3) their beliefs about the barriers that exist for young people in being or becoming change agents. \ud \ud Findings from this study offer important implications for higher education institutions that aim to engage in positive youth development as part of the curricular or extra-curricular provision. By illuminating the perceived barriers and enablers for youth in driving social change, higher education institutions will be in a stronger position from which to nurture this generation of ‘changemakers’.

Over the last two decades the failure of traditional work-integration measures to significantly reduce unemployment has led to a rise in the number of WISEs. Borzaga and Loss (2006) reported that WISE interventions had a beneficial impact upon the personal, social and employment skills of those individuals that they engaged. However, such research has so far only measured vaguely defined personal characteristics and more detailed analysis of the individual benefits of WISE interventions are required (Aiken, 2007). Prior psychological research has demonstrated that individuals with elevated levels of self-efficacy will accomplish higher educational achievements and have improved career prospects (Bandura 1977, 1997; Lent et al., 1991). Additionally, Delmar & Davidson (2000) report that self-efficacy has been shown by previous research to be an important component in self-employment as a career choice and thus as an indicator of a positive attitude to enterprise (ATE). This paper reports the results of a longitudinal study that examined a WISE in Northamptonshire cooperating with a local university in order to re-integrate unemployed graduates into the labour-market. The intervention combined studying a Masters level business module and engaging in a work placement, which together were designed to raise participant self-efficacy and ATE. Results reveal the impact of the intervention on participant levels of self-efficacy and ATE. The authors propose that robust and rigorous analysis of the potential positive impacts of WISE interventions utilising relevant academic instruments is important in order to demonstrate the benefits of WISE interventions to policy-makers

The on-going global economic difficulties and the subsequent increases in unemployment have led the UK government to look at innovative ways of reintegrating unemployed people back into work. Nowhere is this more critical than in the area of youth unemployment, which in the UK is steadily rising for young people aged 16-24 years who are not in employment, education or training (NEET). As part of this strategy work-integration social enterprises (WISEs) have become providers of employment enhancement programmes (EEPs) that aim to improve the employability of NEETs, in part due to the 'added value' that WISEs are seen to bring to such programmes. However, this perception, along with the requirements of public funding contracts, creates a pressure on WISEs to demonstrate such 'added value' through rigorous evaluation procedures. However, there is little academic research that both attempts to measure WISE performance in relation to 'outcomes' and to understand how organisational type and structure affects this. This research study takes a comparative, multi-case study approach to study three separate work-integration organisations delivering EEPs to NEETs. Two of these organisations are WISEs and the other organisation is a 'for-profit' private company utilised in this study as a comparison group. In order to provide a rigorous measure of outcome, all participants completed three different self-efficacy scales and engaged in individual semi-structured interviews with researchers before and after engagement in their respective programmes (Time 1 & Time 2). Results from the qualitative analysis of the interviews and the statistical analysis of the questionnaire data are triangulated to evaluate the outcome from all three programmes, providing the participant perspective alongside changes in self-efficacy. In addition, semi-structured interviews and focus groups were held with the owners and staff at the organisations respectively, in order to elicit understanding of how the differing aims, values and structures present at each organisation impacted upon the delivery of the programmes and hence upon the outcome benefits experienced by the NEETs. The results of the research provide an opportunity to compare and contrast programmes delivered by social enterprises with that of a 'for-profit' company in order to give an insight into programme and outcome differences based upon the orientation of the delivery organisation. Results revealed no significant difference between the outcome benefits experienced by the NEETs at the WISEs and those NEETs present at the for-profit comparison group. However, analysis of the effect of the organisational aims, values and structures upon the delivery of EEPs, suggests that the 'added value' offered by WISEs, whilst not immediately evident in the outcome data, came from the induction policies that they operated and their willingness to work with more socially excluded individuals.

If young people not in employment, education or training (NEET) participate in Entrepreneurial Skills Programmes (ESPs), delivered by social enterprises, there is an ethical responsibility to measure the outcomes of these programmes. So called "hard‟ outcomes, such as new businesses created or jobs secured, are self evident but potential "soft‟ outcomes, such as attitude to enterprise or general self-efficacy, are less evident. This exploratory study aimed to develop evaluation techniques for the assessment of "soft‟ outcomes on participants after completing a six-week ESP delivered by a work-integration social enterprise (WISE)