Social Enterprise Chicago Information

Mission Statement: Social Enterprise Chicago acts as a convener, collaborator, and catalyst to empower for-profit, nonprofit and hybrid ventures deploying earned-revenue strategies to create positive social, economic, and environmental change. Vision Statement: Harnessing the power of enterprise to foster positive social, economic, and environmental change. --------------------- Social Enterprise Chicago believes that social ventures can play a productive role in advancing positive social, economic, and environmental change by: * Deploying strategies that seek to maximize social, economic, and environmental benefit in the way they conduct business; * Harnessing growing consumer consciousness about and preferences for businesses that act fairly, humanely, and sustainably; * Creating ethical buying options for consumers that reflect their values; * Promoting corporate practices and policies that are accountable to all stakeholders; and, expanding the ethical use of, and access to, technology. Among Social Enterprise Chicago’s early initiatives is the Social Enterprise Certificate program co-developed with the University of Illinois at Chicago. Launched in the of Spring 2019, the program runs twice a year, bringing together social entrepreneurs and socially impactful leaders and business students, from the community and beyond, in a highly successful 16-week program. SocEntChi will run two incubators per year, one that starts in the spring and another in the fall. While the number in each cohort will vary, we are targeting early-stage social enterprises for the spring session and social enterprises who are ripe to scale in the fall session. The cohorts will receive coaching, mentorship, and business templates from the board members and the partners of SocEntChi. SocEntChi will also help the cohort market their businesses and connect them to others in SocEntChi's network. At the end of every cohort, SocEntChi will facilitate and host a pitch competition.