The YET 2022 winners

In July, the Brussels-Capital Region launched the 2021 ‘Raising awareness of entrepreneurship among young people and supporting them in implementing their entrepreneurial project’ call for projects, all against the backdrop of economic transition. 

Over two years, this initiative offers financial support of €2,449,670.93 for eight projects, which will have the following characteristics:

• raise awareness of general secondary, vocational, sandwich or out-of-school training among young people, or
• support students and/or alumni who wish to become entrepreneurs with their entrepreneurial project,
• emphasis on the economic transition.

They should also include one of the three themes of the Go4Brussels 2030 Strategy and the Regional Policy Statement, which are:

• the economic transition
• female entrepreneurship
• diversity entrepreneurship

The three selected “awareness” projects

Boost Your Talent

• Supported by: Young Enterprises/Groupe ONE ASBL/100,000 entrepreneurs

The objective of Boost Your Talent is to give young people in Brussels, in both vocational and general education, the opportunity to:

• develop their entrepreneurial skills and potential, so they can become stakeholders in their professional life project,
• find their place in society while having a positive impact on their environment.

Boost Your Talent offers an entrepreneurial cycle that can be adapted to the student’s profile or the school’s educational project, based on four themes addressed through various workshops.

They all prepare for a unifying event: Boost Your Planet – a Hackathon allowing people to answer an economic transition challenge linked to the Brussels ecosystem and proposed by a local stakeholder.

Training in Entrepreneurial Pedagogy

• Ported by: Step2You of the Institut Catholique des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (ICHEC)

This is a 30-hour training course for teachers and future teachers to enable them to:

• learn about every aspect of entrepreneurship at school,
• work on their role as teachers and their position,
• receive the necessary tools for classroom implementation.

They will also be able to discover tools to implement in class, as well as the Brussels eco-system around awareness and support for young entrepreneurs in taking action.

Capital Belgium

• Supported by Capital Young Sustainable Entrepreneurs

On the one hand, this project aims to inform and inspire young people (aged 16-25) about entrepreneurship by focusing on social entrepreneurship. The objective is to develop a digital centre within the CAPITAL “industrial zone”, where young people can learn about the use of AR technology. This programme is aimed at students in the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th years of secondary schools in Brussels and youth organisations in Brussels.

On the other hand, the objective is to set up one “A to Z” session (bootcamp) per quarter for young people in Brussels (aged 16-25) on entrepreneurship, with a focus on the Sustainable Development Goals.

The five projects to support the selected students and alumni

Boost Your Project

• Leaders: GROUPE ONE /Young Enterprises/100,000 Entrepreneurs/FOUNDATION FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS

Boost Your Project is a project that has been in existence since 2017 and aims to raise awareness of sustainable entrepreneurship and help Brussels’ university students to start a project and then take action.

The project offers a free, inclusive and quality support programme with four areas:

• awareness, support,
• networking and
• methodological development between academic institutions.

For the first time, Boost Your Project is including four universities in its steering committee.

Start.LAB

Supported by Cascade

Originating from the Solvay Business Schools of the ULB, this was the first Brussels incubator (2016) for students and young graduates under 30 years of age.

Its mission is to create, encourage and develop young entrepreneurs from all walks of life who want to start a business with a high environmental, social and/or societal impact. In practical terms, the Start.LAB offers awareness-raising activities and a complete support programme.

Start.VUB

Supported by Universitaire Associatie Brussel

This VUB incubator is also an incubation programme for young (aged 18-30) student entrepreneurs and alumni.

Start.VUB focuses on the personal and professional development of young entrepreneurs by offering a wide range of training courses, coaching sessions, expert sessions, events, etc. The project is open to all Dutch-speaking students in the Brussels Region.

StartLAB.BRUSSELS.

These two incubators have decided to merge under the
StartLAB.BRUSSELS brand, which now clearly identifies as an incubator:

• trilingual,
• open to all young people with entrepreneurial, social and environmental goals. 

The Start Lab ICHEC (SLI)

Supported by: Institut Catholique des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (ICHEC)

This incubator reveals, supports and develops the entrepreneurial skills of young people (those in higher education and those who graduated less than two years ago) so they can implement resilient, sustainable, responsible business projects that create jobs and positive societal values.

The SLI offers a welcome, training, coaching, expertise, a specific academic path, networking and visibility for the project leaders selected in the framework of its activation mission.

The SLI helps to provide these young people with the skills and knowledge they need to carry out their projects.

In addition to supporting young entrepreneurs starting out, the SLI also has a mission to raise awareness of entrepreneurship among young people in Brussels.

EPHEC Entreprendre @BXL

Supported by Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (EPHEC)

It is aimed at student-entrepreneurs of the EPHEC in Brussels, who decide to create their own company in addition to their training.

The students in question have the help of an entrepreneurial coach and members of the Ephec Entreprendre team, made up of professors who are experts in the various fields taught at EPHEC.

In addition to this ongoing support, students who wish to do so may choose to work on their project as part of their internship and present their project in their final thesis.

It is mainly economic stakeholders who receive the budgets and not the educational institutions directly.

For more information, please consult the projects on the yet.brussels website