Press Kit | The Possibilists Directory

Contact

Matthias Scheffelmeier, Co-Founder and Managing Director of ChangemakerXchange / The Possibilists:
Miriam Sweeney, Programmes Lead at ChangemakerXchange / The Possibilists:

Press Release

May 2022: New worldwide alliance launches global ‘Yellow Pages’ with offers for support for young changemakers

Press Kit

Full Press Kit, including press release, pictures of young changemakers, quotes and more.

Additional Resources

FAQ

The Possibilists

What is it?
The Possibilists is a joint initiative between 16 of the world’s biggest and leading youth social innovation communities. Together, they work directly with hundreds of thousands of young social innovators and reach a social media audience of over 3 million. It is the first time in the sector so many organisations have come together to collaborate and co-create solutions to create better conditions for Changemakers so they can thrive personally and sustain and scale their impact.

The Possibilists is kindly supported by Google.org and SAP

Our Mission
The Possibilists aims to create a shared understanding of the needs of young changemakers in order to increase alignment and desire within the support ecosystem to collaboratively improve the conditions, so that young Changemakers thrive personally and are supported to sustain and scale their impact.

What does it do?

(a) Research & Report
We run scientific studies to explore the impact, challenges and needs of these young changemakers. We believe these reports will become a leading resource for governments, foundations, civil society and anyone willing to support young social innovators

(b) Collective Action Projects
We launch collective action projects targeted at improving the ecosystem for young changemakers, the first being The Possibilists Directory, a repository of support offers or changemakers.

Possibilists Directory
The Possibilists Directory is a global repository of nearly 500 grant making, capacity building and support programs for young social innovators. It will be freely accessible for young changemakers at www.thepossibilists.org/directory/. The listings are hand-picked and curated with the help of young innovators from across the Possibilists network, to ensure every listing is relevant and contains the most up to date information.

Key Findings from the 2021 The Possibilists report:

The Global Study

The Possibilists conducted a 40+ question in-depth study on changemakers. We surveyed 791 young social innovators from 137 countries across the world.
Focus of the study: People aged 18-35 who have started their own impact focused initiatives, either their own ventures or driving social/environmental change from within a bigger organization. 35% of respondents are in the start-up phase, 37% operational and 28% are in the scaling phase.
Participants in the study come from the networks of Ashoka, ChangemakerXchange, The Diana Award, Global Changemakers, Kofi Annan Foundation, Masterpeace, Obama Foundation, One Young World, Peace First, Social Impact Award, Social Shifters, SOS Children’s Villages, Unleash, We are Family Foundation, Yunus & Youth and YSI (Young Sustainable Impact).
The study gathers key insights about their impact, their struggles and makes key recommendations of how we can all support them better.
Gender representation: 53% were female, 45% male, and 2% were non binary or preferred not to say. 27% of respondents consider themselves to be part of a marginalized group The survey was conducted between February 19th – March 4th, 2021 and distributed among the 16 partner networks, as well as other young changemaker communities around the world.
Diversity of demographics: sample includes young changemakers from a mix of rural / urban areas, and a significant number from marginalized groups.
Period: the survey was conducted between February 19th – March 4th, 2021.

Key challenges that young changemakers face:

Young changemakers are sacrificing their financial security and wellbeing to change the world.
Financial issues: 66% cannot compensate themselves beyond a token amount for their work on their initiatives (41% not at all), and only 9% can live off their ventures.
Wellbeing issues: 59% have experienced some degree of burnout since they started work on their initiative.
64% feel their work is negatively affected by systemic inequalities.
The COVID-19 crisis has increased both their capacity and desire to make a change in the world.
Only 3% have been forced to close down activities due to COVID; the majority are innovating, adapting and responding to the challenge.

The European Report

Focus of the report: The newly released report takes a closer look at European changemakers, by focusing on the data of participants who currently reside in Europe. The study includes 200 respondents from 32 European countries. The most represented countries in the sample are Germany (18%), the UK (14%), Spain (9%), France (8,5%), Romania (8%) and the Netherlands (6%). The report also pays specific attention to the challenges and needs that young social innovators who self-identify as belonging to a marginalized group face in developing their initiatives. The European Report was published in December 2021.

Key Results

54% of young changemakers in Europe have experienced some form of burnout and only 19% can live off of their ventures. The very young, women and those belonging to a marginalized group(s) report the highest levels of burnout risk and self-doubt.

The three main challenges that young social innovators in Europe face:

61% experience a lack of personal financial security
59% say they are juggling various responsibilities and being stretched too thin
54% see themselves at high risk of burnout

The Possibilists Brand Material

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