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Social Enterprise Alliance (as cited in Chong & Kleeman, 2011, p. 2) defines social enterprise as “an organisation or venture that achieves its primary social or environmental mission using business methods […] the social enterprise movement includes both non-profits that use business models to pursue their mission and for-profits whose primary purposes are social.” Social entrepreneurship is a rapidly growing discipline that is attracting the interest of governments, researchers, media, and organisations (Defourney & Nyssens, 2010; Stevens, Moray, & Bruneel, 2015), and this is not just about making profits, but enhancing the lives of people. Entrepreneurial activities that embark on social entrepreneurship are called social enterprises, and differ from any other entrepreneurial organisations in that their major goal or focus is on social value creation. These also possess the ability to impact nations economically, environmentally, and socially by solving most pressing problems such as poverty, hunger, pollution, and education, to name but a few, through the provision of their innovative products and services (Bugg-Levine, Kogut, & Kulatilaka, 2012; Smith, Cronley, & Barr, 2012).
Since social enterprises can be either public or private, the study focused on public social enterprises that offer special needs education to children who have struggled in mainstream schools. Public special schools can be considered as social enterprises because they are non-profit making and they have a social mission to reintegrate students with special needs back into formal education systems as well as work places. In order for social enterprises, including special schools, to function effectively and efficiently, they need sustainable funding (Hofstrand, 2013; Bugg-Levine et al., 2012; Martin, 2015; Tulchin & Lin, 2012). However, Bugg-Levine et al. (2012) claim that the lack of funding is one of the challenges those social enterprises face worldwide. Consequently, social enterprises can no longer rely only on one form of funding but need alternative forms of funding for them to survive, because there is stiff competition to access them (Chong & Kleeman, 2011). It is thus important for social enterprises to know how to source funds for their businesses. Martin (2015) explains that these sources can range from traditional to modern methods of funding such as philanthropic grants, donations, revenue streams, personal savings, loans, equity and debt capital, crowd funding and social impact bonds. The findings of this study will help special schools to identify various sources of funding that may contribute towards the attainment of the schools’ goals.