When times get hard economically the arts are often the first to get hit. Funding is cut and services are stopped or reduced significantly. This is despite much research about the importance of the arts across society, and often for certain demographics in particular.
Social Entrepreneurs Ireland (SEI), whose vision is “accelerated social change through the power of people” recognises the importance of community and social entrepreneurship globally, and the value of arts in the community specifically.
Dr Francesca La Morgia, who founded Mother Tongues, says the support of SEI goes far beyond monetary or business support but also affects the social entrepreneurs on a personal level: “It’s given me the confidence to recognise that this idea is worthwhile, and I can consider myself a leader.”
From the Ideas Academy, where entrepreneurs are supported from the initial spark of an idea to the pilot stage, to the Impact programme, for projects that are already operational but need to “develop and lean on other strengths such as planning, teamwork, collaboration, bigger picture thinking and decision making”, there’s support at every stage of the journey.
For those with a proven solution to a social problem who want to increase their impact, there’s the Changing Ireland Accelerator, which offers 12 months of one-to-one support, consultancy and coaching in leadership development, marketing, strategic planning, governance and finance.
dabbledoo
Dabbledoo “started from my work in Trinity College where I did a master’s in music and media technology in 2008″, says founder Shane McKenna.
“I was exploring the use of alternative forms of music notation to make musical performance and music education more accessible for a range of performers, young and old. Killian [Redmond], who I met through music and arts events in Dublin, and I teamed up to create a children’s book and range of online resources based on this research.”
After several years of workshops and events around Ireland, working with thousands of teachers, children and parents, McKenna and Redmond developed an online platform called dabbledoomusic.
“From school visits, I had found that music was considered a difficult subject to teach and that teachers lacked the confidence and resources to make the best of music in the classroom. Dabbledoomusic became a platform where teachers could find all the resources, content and help they need to bring music to their classroom and give the children all the benefits of music making and music education.”
By 2015 dabbledoo had created an entire online curriculum for primary school and a range of amazing online resources for the classroom, but no one was paying for its services.
“I had to move out of Dublin to look after a friend’s house in the Wicklow mountains [to save on rent] and lived there for three years trying to get the company off the ground,” says McKena. “Just me and a cat.”
In 2016, dabbledoo won the SEI Elevator Award, and the funding and support helped it reach its first 50 schools. Today dabbledoo is in more than 1,400 schools, almost half the primary schools in Ireland, reaching more than 200,000 children.
“Two years ago we launched a drama programme and this year we are launching our visual-art programme for primary schools,” says McKenna.
“We want to ensure that the arts subjects are accessible to all children in Ireland and that many benefits of the arts and arts education are felt in their school lives and their lives outside school.”
Dabbledoo is now a team of eight and works with thousands of teachers across the State who help to constantly improve and update the content.
“We are educators, artists and designers dedicated to making arts resources that will enrich the lives of children everywhere,” says McKenna.
Mother Tongues
Mother Tongues started in 2017, its purpose to inspire more people to be open to different languages and cultures. That’s because in Ireland one in five children are growing up speaking more than one language, says founder Francesca La Morgia.
“I believed that there wasn’t enough information out there for parents who are embarking on this journey, that parents were given advice that was conflicting and were worrying and then giving up their language in favour of English,” says Dr La Morgia.
“My background is as a lecturer/researcher on bilingualism. I knew a lot of the findings from research were not informing parents. So I set up Mother Tongues.”
Initially, a lot of the work was around sharing the information through talks and information sheets and websites. Then, over time, Mother Tongues developed a specific programme for families to come to sessions together and speak their languages.
La Morgia was part of SEI’s Impact programme in 2020: “At the time I was looking at developing Mother Tongues into a stronger organisation, to have more of a strategic vision and to really have a bigger impact. I applied for the Impact programme and was in it for a year.
“Firstly, it helped me because I found like-minded people in the programme who had similar struggles – for example, staffing issues, fundraising issues and communications.
“We were at different stages of our social entrepreneurial journey but we had a lot of knowledge that we could share that we had built in our own careers and our work. For me there were some very specific sessions that I got to attend around fundraising and raising awareness of the organisation and communication, which were of huge benefit.”
Thanks to the Impact programme, Mother Tongues was able to better define its mission and narrow down what it was doing, which led to it being more focused and thus increasing its impact.
“Even in the last year we had more than 1,000 parents and children who participated in our programmes and were able to do that because we were able to be focused,” says La Morgia.
Another important thing that emerged from the programme for La Morgia is that, although she had never seen herself as the leader, at SEI “we had plenty of discussions about leadership and social change and why it’s important for the social entrepreneur to both be recognised and recognise your own work”.
“It’s given me the confidence to recognise that this idea is worthwhile, and I can consider myself a leader.”
Helium Arts
It is well known and demonstrated by the World Health Organisation’s Behavioural and Cultural Insights Programme that creativity supports recovery and wellbeing, says Helium Arts founder Helene Hugel.
“Helium Arts provides a programme of art workshops for children with long-term health conditions, aged six-to-15 years, using an evidence-based framework of creativity,” says Hugel. “In this environment, artists teach the habits of imagination, inquisitiveness, discipline, persistence and collaboration.
“Helium Arts can’t take away the illness but, in this environment, we can remove these social barriers and seek to make a positive impact on the lives of children living with long-term health conditions through this process.
“Our art workshops aim to remove barriers prohibiting children from participating in mainstream activities by providing medical support in the room, supporting ability and inclusivity through one-to-one support with volunteers, at no cost to parents, close to home and at inclusive and accessible venues.
“Children can participate and attend on their own, without their parent or guardian. Parents point out that this is something that is not typically provided by other community-based services.”
Hugel first engaged with Social Entrepreneurs Ireland in 2007 through the Elevator programme, and again in 2009.
“I was working freelance as an artist, puppeteer and clown doctor when I first applied to SEI with a big idea to support the wellbeing of children in hospital through the arts,” she says.
“I was one person then, and now we are 20 staff with an income of nearly €1 million and impacting over 3,000 children a year across Ireland, working through six hospitals and 10 community locations, with a national reach through our online programme.”
In 2020 Hugel took part in SEI’s Adapt programme, which supported social entrepreneurs to pivot their offering during the pandemic. It helped Hugel and Helium in several key areas, including by providing a support network of four fellow social entrepreneurs, all facing similar challenges.