Organizations such as Ashoka, Echoing Green, the Unreasonable Institute and others offer various opportunities from scholarships to fellowships to social entrepreneurs every year.
Here is a list of top 20 opportunities for social entrepreneurs around the globe.
Unreasonable Institute gets entrepreneurs what they need to scale solutions to the world’s biggest problems.
Unreasonable Institute gets entrepreneurs what they need to scale solutions to the world’s biggest problems. Unreasonable Institute does this by identifying entrepreneurs with the potential to address problems like poverty, lack of education, and social injustice at scale, and then by swarming them with mentors, funders, and partners to help grow their impact.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Unreasonable Institute
3. Hult Prize for Social Enterprise (US$1,000,000 to solve the world’s toughest challenges)
The Hult Prize Foundation is a start-up accelerator for budding young social entrepreneurs emerging from the world’s universities.
Hult Prize aims to identify and launch the most compelling social business ideas—start-up enterprises that tackle grave issues faced by billions of people.
The Hult Prize is offered in partnership with Former US President Bill Clinton and the Clinton Global Initiative. It is hosted and supported by Hult International Business School. And it is generously funded by Swedish entrepreneur Bertil Hult and his family. It has been called the “Nobel Prize for Students” by media outlets world-wide.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Hult Prize for Social Enterprise
4. Acumen Global Fellowship Program for Next Generation of Social Impact Leaders
The Acumen Global Fellows Program is a 12-month fellowship for individuals dedicated to serving the poor and who have the business and operational expertise, and moral imagination needed to effect long-term social change.
The fellowship begins with an eight-week training program in the Acumen New York office, where Fellows learn about business models for the poor, hone their leadership skills, and learn more about Acumen.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Acumen Global Fellowship Program
Originally created in Istanbul by Ashoka and supported by the Robert Bosch Stiftung, the ChangemakerXchange is a global collaboration platform for young social entrepreneurs. It gathers some of the world’s most exciting changemakers at summits around the world for the exchange and co-creation of ideas. The ChangemakerXchange now brings together young social entrepreneurs from 25 different countries in Europe, Turkey and North Africa.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Ashoka ChangemakerXchange Programme
6. Social Entrepreneurship Forum Outreach Accelerator for Social Entrepreneurs, Stockholm Sweden (Fully Funded)The SE Outreach Accelerator is an exciting 8 week program that takes place in Stockholm, Sweden. It is a capacity-building program that is designed to equip the participants with entrepreneurial skills to enable them to scale up their impact and accelerate their growth, thereby creating a multiplier effect of the positive impact they are having.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Social Entrepreneurship Forum Outreach Accelerator
7. Skoll Masters Scholarships in Social Entrepreneurship for International Students to study in the UK.
The Skoll Scholarship is a competitive scholarship for incoming MBA students who pursue entrepreneurial solutions for urgent social and environmental challenges. The Scholarship provides funding and exclusive opportunities to meet with world-renowned entrepreneurs, thought-leaders and investors. Once selected, these students are known as Skoll Skollars.
The Skoll Scholarship provides tuition for entrepreneurs who have set up or have been working in entrepreneurial ventures with a social purpose, and who wish to improve their knowledge of market-oriented practices so they can be more effective in their subsequent social change pursuits.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Skoll Masters Scholarships
9. D-Prize Challenge ($20,000 Prize) for Social Entrepreneurs.
D-Prize is a call to the world’s boldest entrepreneurs. Can you design a new social enterprise and solve one of the distribution challenges? If selected, D-Prize will award you up to $20,000 to launch a pilot in Africa, India, or another other developing region. D-Prize will award 5-15 social entrepreneurs funding.
Visit the Official Webpage of the D-Prize Challenge
10. She Entrepreneurs Leadership Programme for Young Emerging Women Social Entrepreneurs, Sweden.
She Entrepreneurs is a leadership programme for young emerging women social entrepreneurs in the Middle East, North Africa and Sweden. The programme aims to give the participants innovative tools for sustainable change while seeking to create an active network of women change-makers.
She Entrepreneurs runs for one year, with participants meeting for ten days in Sweden and one week in the MENA region. In between the modules, the participants work on their own initiative locally, coached by group mentors over digital platforms.
11. Yunus & Youth Fellowship Programme for Social Entrepreneurs.
The Yunus & Youth Fellowship Programme for Social Entrepreneurs is a 6-month global program empowering young social entrepreneurs to develop to their fullest potential and supporting them to build, expand, and accelerate their social venture.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Yunus & Youth Fellowship Programme
12. Social Entrepreneurs Transforming Africa Fellowship Programme.
Social Entrepreneurs Transforming Africa (SET Africa) is a fellowship program for young social entrepreneurs from across Anglophone Africa. SET Africa provides these young leaders with training, networking, and funding opportunities.
The programme is managed by the Makerere University Business School (MUBS) Entrepreneurship Centre in Kampala, Uganda. SET Africa is part of the YouthActionNet® global network of 16 institutes supporting 889 young social entrepreneurs around the world who are impacting 1.3 million lives annually.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Social Entrepreneurs Transforming Africa Fellowship Programme.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Skoll Awards for Social Entrepreneurship.
14. Global Social Venture Competition for Aspiring Entrepreneurs ($50,000 in prize money)
The Global Social Venture Competition is the world’s preeminent social venture competition providing aspiring entrepreneurs with mentoring, exposure, and $50,000 in prize money to transform their business ideas into positive real-world impact.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Global Social Venture Competition
15. Kanthari International Training for Social Change Agents ,India- Scholarships available
Kanthari International welcomes participants over 22 years of age who have overcome significant life challenges ranging from vision impairment, disability, poverty, war, discrimination, and exploitation. They could also be witnesses to social situations they wish to change so others do not suffer. They should have a passion to make the world a better place and the strength to be forces of good rather than be victims of circumstance.
kanthari’s seven month program will help participants develop all necessary skills to succeed as social change-makers.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Kanthari International Training for Social Change Agents
16. Grameen Foundation Fellowship for Social Innovators ( 12-month field placement ,monthly stipend & Ongoing Professional Development)
The Grameen Foundation Fellowship is a unique opportunity for talented business and technology professionals to gain in-depth, hands-on field experience in the social sector. Each 12-month field placement is individually tailored to match your skills and interests with the needs of Grameen Foundation and its partners around the world.
During their year in the field, the Fellows work with some of the brightest minds in social innovation on projects designed to accelerate the impact, scale and sustainability of some of the world’s most promising organizations committed to alleviating global poverty
Visit the Official Webpage of the Grameen Foundation Fellowship
17. Akili Dada Fellowship for Young African Women driving transformative change in their communities.
The Akili Dada Fellowship is an opportunity for young African women to design and implement solutions to the challenges faced by their communities.
These one-year fellowships are awarded to young women leaders between the ages of 18-35 who are driving transformative change in their communities and are looking to grow their projects to scale and sustainability.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Akili Dada Fellowship
18. Spark* Changemaker Program for Social Entrepreneurs (South Africa and Kenya)
Spark* finds and supports these Changemakers and connects them with opportunities that will help them grow their impact, bringing more people out of poverty.
Visit the Official Webpage of the Spark* Changemaker Program
19. Global Good Fund Fellowship Program for Social Entrepreneurs (USD 10,000)
The Global Good Fund invests in high potential young leaders tackling the world’s greatest social issues through entrepreneurship. The GGF engages these leaders through a 15-month Fellowship experience. They support the leadership development of Fellows in their natural work environments. The GGF provide access to a 360 leadership assessment personalized for social entrepreneurs, one-on-one executive coaching, a personalized Leadership Development Plan,an industry executive level coach, and up to USD 10,000 of funding to be used in line with leadership development funding
Visit the Official Webpage of the Global Good Fund Fellowship Program