The project planned to create, in alignment with its priority of creating upskilling pathways and improving accessibility to adult education - a blended approach consisting of a mixture of remote learning, in particular the creation of a MOOC for female social entrepreneurship and supporting coaching sessions for the creation of social enterprises. The first specific objective of the project was to strengthen the adult education sector by providing coaching skills and competences for adult educators to effectively support women in an entrepreneurship path through a blended approach. The second specific objective was to provide and strengthen the skills and competences of women for a successful career development with a strong focus on social entrepreneurship by offering tailor-made high quality learning opportunities for adults. To do so the project developed an innovative online training (MOOC), coaching sessions and networking and mentoring opportunities at local, national and European level. The third specific objective was to increase awareness among women, adult educators, policy makers and the general public on the challenge of gender equality and the importance of female empowerment and social entrepreneurship.
The decision to apply for this project was driven by the pressing inequality challenges faced by women, particularly those in rural areas within the EU. Meath Partnership applied for this project to develop innovative tools and skills to effectively fight social exclusion and gender inequality for women that we work with on a regular basis through our various programmes and our community outreach. Our research has shown that women are grossly underrepresented in the entrepreneurial sector, mainly attributed to numerous barriers they face in establishing and running businesses, including socio-cultural obstacles, difficulties related to balancing work and family life, limited financial opportunities and a lack of opportunities for lifelong learning, education, and training to develop entrepreneurship key competence and business skills. The U.POWER project has highlighted the role of social entrepreneurship as a tool to address the aforementioned challenges faced by women, and addressed the need for innovative tools and skills to effectively fight social exclusion and gender inequality for women by creating a unique blended learning approach to social entrepreneurship that encompasses self-directed learning with mentoring support.