• High School/Grades 9-12

Culturingua’s Global Social Entrepreneurship Journey joins high school students in San Antonio, Texas, and in Benghazi, Libya, to develop a social enterprise idea that solves a United Nations Sustainable Development Goal.

Participants work synchronously (live) and asynchronously under the guidance of trained facilitators and use the Design Thinking process to create a solution solving global challenges such as affordable and clean energy, quality education, and good health and well-being. Students develop cross-cultural communication and collaboration skills while building an innovative, entrepreneurial mindset to solve real-world problems.

Activities

Team members develop their social enterprise idea by empathizing with their target population, defining the problem, ideating on the best solution, forecasting their impact on people or environment, evaluating the market opportunity, and pitching their business plan. Every week, each team completes a task together both synchronously (live) and asynchronously. The teams are invited to pitch their business ideas to a panel of successful social entrepreneurs and community leaders where finalists, comprising of team members from both countries, are selected to present live, in-person at San Antonio Entrepreneurship Week. 

Program Details

• Number of Participants: 300
• Participant Age Group: High School/Grades 9-12
• Partners in the United States: Texas — San Antonio Independent School District, LaunchSA
• Partners in the Middle East and North Africa: Libya — THINKCreative Organization, Benghazi Center for the Gifted, Hamzat Wasel Center
• Project Duration: April 2021– June 2023

Global Social Entrepreneurship Journey is implemented by Culturingua and is supported by the J. Christopher Stevens Virtual Exchange Initiative (JCSVEI). JCSVEI is a U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs program administered by the Aspen Institute.