Future Fund 2012-2013

Design Lab & Beyond: Future Fund Supporting Youth Social Entrepreneurship
in Ontario

Michael Chan, Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport congratulated 23 Ontario organizations creating economic opportunities for youth at a Toronto announcement in June.

Building on the success of previous efforts to create positive economic opportunities for youth, the Ontario Trillium Foundation has selected a new theme for its Future Fund program for 2012-2013: Support for Youth Social Entrepreneurship in Ontario. OTF will allocate $5 million to this theme in the coming year.

This round of the Future Fund will strengthen the foundations of youth social entrepreneurship: the projects that incubate entrepreneurial ideas, networks, programs that accelerate successful entrepreneurship models and hubs that bring together resources to support entrepreneurship in Ontario.

Through investments in these foundations, the Future Fund aims to support social enterprise opportunities for youth that are both viable and sustainable.

Why Youth Social Entrepreneurship?
Social enterprises are a growing segment of the economy that is creating real jobs for people. Developing social entrepreneurship is a way to reduce dependency on traditional sources of funding, empower organizations to finance their own sustainability and encourage innovation. [ More ]

The Future Fund Plan: How you can be a part of it

• Summer 2012: Learning more about what's already happening in the social enterprise world. Our first goal is to map social entrepreneurship across the province. (If you have a role in the social enterprise world, we should already have heard from you.)
• Early Fall 2012: OTF will host a Design Lab: to support individuals and organizations involved in social entrepreneurship. They will come together to collectively think through, develop, and refine potential projects. All participants will benefit from the intense learning and networking.
• Late Fall 2012: A "pitch session" for invited applicants to pitch their ideas/projects to OTF staff and partners.

For questions about the Future Fund, please contact the Future Fund Program Manager, Tracey Robertson at trobertson@otf.ca

Did you know? ... Interesting facts about the Future Fund Focused on high-impact opportunities and issues in the not-for-profit sector, the Future Fund has been guided by the following theory of change: If we make significant, long-term investments in a portfolio of innovative initiatives, and support them through high engagement relationship and networking, this will be a catalyst for transformative change. So far, the Future Fund has invested $16 million in 40 initiatives focused on four themes: 2008 - Building Capacity of the Environment Sector 2009 - Innovative Economic Opportunities 2010 - Building Skills for the Green Economy 2011 - Economic Opportunities for Ontario Youth In addition to the $4 million invested in Economic Opportunities for Ontario Youth through the Future Fund, an additional $2 million was invested in 2011-2012 through 14 Community and Province-wide grants. The Future Fund has been rooted in Developmental Evaluation, which is particularly useful when supporting innovation and emerging ideas and trends. OTF has captured feedback which has helped support decision-making at every stage. The evaluation results of a study OTF (pdf) conducted demonstrate that the Future Fund has successfully achieved its goal to become a catalyst for transformational change. Grantees reported major and lasting change as a result of the Future Fund grants. The majority of grantees said the Future Fund succeeded in its goal of fostering innovation and collaboration.