BUSINESS                      EDMONTON JOURNAL

EDMONTON / Four local service organizations were awarded $10,000 each by Edmonton's $7-million Social Enterprise Fund to help kick-start new community based ventures.
    The awards, which include 25 hours of free coaching from business-startup experts at TEC Edmonton and novaNAIT, were handed out at the conclusion of a weekend boot camp for "social entrepreneurs" at NAIT.
    The boot camp, which drew about 30 participants, was aimed at developing entrepreneurial skills for those launching new, self-sustaining social service ventures.
    The winners include:
Norwood Child and Family Resource Centre: It plans to partner with an Edmonton firm to offer child and family support services in the workplace

 

Norwood Child & Family Resource Centre is a charitable nonprofit that has been providing child and family services for over 45 years in Edmonton's inner city.   They have designed a social venture where they will work with large corporations who are willing to invest space to Norwood who in turn, works with the employees of the corporation to design services that meet their needs with a primary focus on children, families and community.

They are in the process of working with a company where they have designed businesses around providing childcare, family and multicultural support as well as establishing a small bistro and drop off/pick up dry cleaning business.   The profit from these businesses will allow Norwood to increase their programming for high risk youth, increase the number of parents that can get respite to decrease the number of children from potential neglect and abuse and will free up at least 80 more spaces for those who are on waiting lists for childcare in the city of Edmonton.

By putting a cost to the benefits for the company like less training needs, increased staff retention and satisfaction, a decrease in absenteeism, we estimated that this current company could in return save 5 times the amount of their investment in space to Norwood.