Ambitious.Africa x Home Street Home x LUTES: Building Entrepreneurial Mindset in Makongeni, Kenya
Ambitious.Africa, Home Street Home, and LUTES have joined forces to build an entrepreneurship bootcamp that encourages entrepreneurial mindset, provides hard skills, and inspires creative problem-solving for the Home Street Home community. We use the train-the-trainer concept for maximizing the impact and making it sustainable. The first edition of the three-day bootcamp with 25 participants will take place in May 2021 in Makongeni, Kenya.
The project was born out of a connection between Ambitious.Africa and HomeStreetHome on social media. After a first meeting, it was obvious that the field of entrepreneurship provided many opportunities for collaboration, and everyone was excited about making things happen together. Soon after, LUT Entrepreneurship Society, LUTES, from Ambitious.Africa network was invited to join the partnership since they have great experience in organizing entrepreneurial activities and have a passion for learning more about the Kenyan entrepreneurial environment.
Home Street Home community.
What is the bootcamp about?
The aim of the entrepreneurship bootcamp is to promote and encourage entrepreneurship in Makongeni, Kenya and provide participants with some tools to get started. Makongeni is a small village of 2,500 people, located on the Kenyan coast. The average income is about 1 USD per day. Most families do not have running water, and electricity is limited. The bootcamp aims to show that anyone can be an entrepreneur by being a problem solver. Furthermore, the bootcamp aims to improve the quality of life in the local community by equipping local community members with innovative and creative problem-solving skills that will have a continuous impact on the local community. The bootcamp is not just a one-time intervention but intends to have a lasting impact.
How will it work?
The bootcamp will take play over three days and is structured for 25 people. The inaugural 2021 bootcamp is centered around ‘training the trainer.’ This means that the 25 people attending are the team members of HomeStreetHome and they will be trained to have the skills to host their own bootcamps in the future. This will allow the trainers to have greater reach, and for the programs to take place year after year. The idea is that these trainers can serve as entrepreneurial mentors for the next generation.
Each of the three days will be focused on a different theme.. The first day is centered around an entrepreneurial mindset and the idea that anyone can be an entrepreneur. This is meant to be a low-barrier entry to entrepreneurship and to inspire people to take entrepreneurial action in their local communities. The second day is focused on building technical skills necessary to be successful in entrepreneurship, including the basics of networking, financial management, and pitching yourself. The third day will be a practical day where participants will put their skills into action to get real-life experience.
Who is behind the entrepreneurial bootcamp?
Home Street Home is a non-profit organization founded and registered in October 2014. They work for the well-being of children and women, to promote education and the rights of girls in Kenya. In addition to practical education, Home Street Home wants to promote entrepreneurship and provide entrepreneurial skills to its students. To make this happen, Home Street Home needed some external expertise and the collaboration between the three parties was born.
The LUT Entrepreneurship Society (LUTES) is a student-run organization for entrepreneurs and entrepreneurially-minded students based in Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology, Finland. LUTES's mission is to drive student entrepreneurship through events, community, and programs. LUT has experience putting on Forward, their flagship 7-week-long annual program for building new startups. As a result, LUTES was interested in adapting their Forward framework and content to fit the goals of the Makongeni Bootcamp as well as to learn about the Kenyan entrepreneurship ecosystem. LUTES was involved in creating the content of the program.
LUTES 2021 Board.
From left to right, upper row first:
Antti Puputti Partnerships
Alexandra (Lexi) Lobdell Events
Noora Saksa President
Ella Teiskonlahti Treasurer
Polina Petrova Programs
Lauri Hollo Community
Meerimaria Ketokulta Marketing
Ambitious.Africa is all about young people working together and leading the change. Ambitious.Africa aims to transform Africa, the Nordics, and the rest of the world via the Triple E- model: Education, Entrepreneurship, and Entrepreneurship. Ambitious.Africa brings people together and this entrepreneurship bootcamp is a great example of the kind of cross-continental collaboration they enable.
Next steps?
Consider joining us in this exciting endeavor that will make a lasting impact. We are still looking for different organizations and individuals to collaborate with us and mentor the teams. If you want to get involved, please, don’t hesitate to contact Maija (maija@ambitiousafrica.org) or Noora (noora@lutes.fi).