fundRaising fOr sTArT up businEsses

<< Background >>The project partners had identified needs for the Young Entrepreneurs and the participating organizations in the matter of fundraising.Young entrepreneurs face difficulties during the initiation of their business planning. A lot of them do not know the financial tools that can be used to fund their business. The lack of knowledge operates as an anti-developmental situation. Learners in business sector in general, have the need to be informed about the fundraising and various methods that they can follow in order to satisfy the needs of their companies. Nevertheless, low-skilled learners might need some consultation around the procedures that need to be followed concerning fundraising. Partners with different experiences in supporting young entrepreneurs were involved:•BK Consult GmbH covered the fields of education and employment. •Opinion & Action Services Ltd provided a broad framework of consulting services in the field of communication, strategic planning and analysis addressed to public authori-ties, and enterprises. •Universal Education offered both long-term and short-term courses for employees in the business sector and holds a strong background in VET education and upskilling of hu-man resources in a variety of fields.<< Objectives >>ROTATE project aimed to train VET teachers and learners in fundraising methods through the development of fundraising processes, upskilling package, and training activities. Therefore, the partners have set for specific objectives (SO), which are to reach out:SO1: Upskill VET teachers and VET learners’ fundraising skills, having the opportunity to be trained in a fundraising upskilling program. SO2: Design and develop new educational resources for VET organizations. The develop-ment of the fundraising framework for start-up businesses through the literature review and the inputs start-up creators. SO3: Provide new learning opportunities to low-skilled VET learners. The upskilling fundraising material will provide easily accessible learning opportunities incorporating exceptional content. SO4: Enhance the sustainability of start-up businesses. There is a lot of start-up companies that struggle financially during the first years of their establishment. The ROTATE project was intended to design and to develop flexible and learner centred VET programmes, and that contribute to closing existing gaps in training for working age adults to successfully manage labour market transitions, to start or maintain their start-up businesses. << Implementation >>Under Activity 1- All necessary “Project Management and Dissemination” activities, like Quality Assurance, project G-Drive, SC meetings and Transnational Project Meetings, to full-fill adminis-trative project issues were carried out.Under Activity 2 - Three country-specific reports for Cyprus, Germany and Greece focussed on available resources, teachers' skills, system support, etc. were developed. The results of these three reports were summarised in a Transnational Report, which beside others defined the learning objectives and the training content with 3 Units.Under Activity 3 - The partners designed the Curriculum with three units, including the transla-tions into German and Greek:•Unit 1: Soft Skills for Fundraising, •Unit 2: How to prepare Fundraising for my Idea, and •Unit 3: Creating a business plan, Under Activity 4 - The partners developed the MOOC platform https://project-rotate.eu/ and the respective training guidelines, including agenda, attendance list, invitation e-mail, online invitation form, etc.Under Dissemination/Communication - The project logo was developed and partners used their own social media accounts on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, X, etc. as well as their public relations networks.<< Results >>Under Activity 1- The following documents were developed: PM and QA handbook. Final QA Report, Mid-term Report, Final Evaluation and Final ReportUnder Activity 2 – The analyse of the context (available resources, teachers' skills, system sup-port, etc.) was laid down in country-specific reports for Cyprus, Germany and Greece, fol-lowed by the Transnational report including important steps for obtaining funding, definition of objectives, and training content with 3 Units.Under Activity 3 – The partners developed the content of the three units Curriculum, including objectives and targets for learner and teachers. This Curriculum is available as PowerPoints incorporating videos, Doc-files under Common Licence in English, German and Greek.Under Activity 4 – The partners developed and tested the MOOC platform https://project-rotate.eu/. Therefore, three trainings each one in Greece, Germany, and Cyprus with 22 ad-herents were realised und evaluated by 16 participants, using the EU survey tool.Under Dissemination/Communication - Partners realised off-line activities, like websites, Face-book, Instagram, LinkedIn, X. 26.408 recipients were reached by these activities. Off-line activi-ties, had a range of 62 persons.