As I passed by in the lobby, my attention was caught by the new poster posted in our bulletin board. It’s about the skills for social entrepreneurs training sponsored by British Council (United Kingdom’s international organization for educational opportunities and cultural relations). I was curious and I registered online right away.
One week before the training, I received a confirmation letter that informed me that I had been selected for the Bacolod round of the Skills for Social Entrepreneurs’ Training Caravan, which was hosted by the University of St. La Salle, on 21 & 22 August 2009. So I hurriedly asked for an endorsement letter from our school and started packing things. Wow, I’m glad that I was chosen as one of the 30 students for the Bacolod round.
I reached Bacolod on September 21st at noon and felt nervous because I was late. The program started in the morning though they already knew that I was coming at noontime since there was no other schedule for Superferry. They gave me a very warm welcome. I was the only participant from Misamis Oriental, there were 2 from Dumaguete College, 8 from West Visayas University, Iloilo city, and the rest are from colleges and universities in city of Bacolod.
At first, I was quiet for we spoke of different dialects and I didn’t have friends yet. So we could understand each other, , we spoke Tagalong. I was the only Bisaya and majority of them were Ilonggo. The participants and residents of Bacolod treated me nicely, their being friendly could be the reason why the city is known as the city of smiles. And namit gid and ila pagkaon!
On our first day of training, they grouped us into five and I belonged to group 3 together with the four participants from West Visayas University. The speaker Ms. Cristyl introduced the meaning of Entrepreneurship. Then the speaker explained each training module and activities to be done; they gave us enough time to do the activity with our group mates. During the open forum, the more I was hesitant because I noticed that they knew each other already. I just then realized that they came from the same school.
The second part of the seminar focused on the actual training that will equip the participants with the necessary tools to generate and develop our social enterprise business plan. It was an actual workshop where participants were given the basic working theory of written ideas put into actual action plans and developing our potential implementation. After that we had our presentation regarding our proposal on how to apply our entrepreneurial skills in the community to solve the ills of society. We had an open forum again together with my group mates. We then had a brainstorming.
The speakers also gave us the guidebook so we could write our ideas and plan on how to help and make a change. Our plan was to minimize numbers of out-of-school youth. We made our own mission and vision statements, theory of change that connects mission to action, activity to do to earn money and budgeting. We thought on garbage collection since it was a major problem in society and from the garbage they find treasure and help the youth.
In every group, 2 were assigned as reporters and I was surprised that I was one of the reporters in our group. I was uncomfortable at first to report our business proposal. I felt I was auditioning in Star Circle Quest with the 3 jurors, the representatives from the British Council, Ms. Cristyl, Mr. Arnel Casanova and Ms. Domingo.
I wanted to disappear when I started to report. I didn’t have the confidence to face from prestigious universities; they speak English fluently with American accent; our speakers were all magna cum laude in Ateneo de Manila. Even the participants didn’t look like students with their corporate attire. I was very conscious if I have uttered each word correctly but I still did my best and I think I’ve done the job well with the help of my group mates. I wanted to express what’s on my mind and pretended I was confident in facing them.
Social Entrepreneurship is a new term. It provides us with an alternative to solve some ills of the society. It is an innovative approach to provide solutions that will allow us to acquire material and social gains at the same time.
One thing I learned from this seminar is to be yourself. You don’t need to pretend just to please people. Just being you is enough to gain friendship and respect. The trip went so great and it’s the best seminar I attended in my whole life! I learned a lot besides being exposed to a new environment with new friends.
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