Year Here

YEAR HERE IS A POSTGRADUATE COURSE IN SOCIAL INNOVATION BASED IN LONDON

The course is a platform for entrepreneurial people to build smart solutions to entrenched social problems.

It’s immersive, action-oriented and grounded in the lived experience of Londoners in care homes, hostels and youth services across London.

Our Fellows try their hand at building creative, scalable responses to social problems, supported by industry mentoring and a rigorous social innovation curriculum.

Our Fellows have collectively volunteered 130,000 hours in frontline services – including homeless shelters, community centres and Pupil Referral Units.

We’ve also launched over 40 ventures like Settle, supporting vulnerable young people who are moving into their first home, Chatterbox, a language tuition service staffed by refugees, and Birdsong, a fashion brand selling clothes handcrafted by women’s groups – from elderly knitters to migrant seamstresses – with a ‘no sweatshops, no photoshop’ ethos.

Collectively they have reached over 15,000 beneficiaries, generated more than £3m revenue and received national coverage in The Guardian, Huffington Post, Independent, Daily Mail, Financial Times, Vice and BBC News.

Our alumni have received six Shackleton awards and six entries on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list, an OBE and have won the CSJ’s Social Enterprise of the Year, among many others.

Year Here was launched at Number 10 Downing Street in March 2013 and, since then, has run twelve programmes for 212 people and been named one of Britain’s 50 New Radicals by Nesta and The Observer.

Our Faculty includes social entrepreneurs, policy makers and innovation experts – from Sophie Howarth, co-founder of School Of Life, to multi award-winning social designer Lauren Currie OBE and the poet Lemn Sissay MBE.

Our Fellows come from all sorts of backgrounds and industries. With an average of 7 years’ career experience, they bring an incredibly diverse set of professional skills and life experiences to the programme. What unites them is their brilliant personal qualities – like resourcefulness, humility and resilience – and their passion for social action.

There are no course fees. Unlike a traditional Master’s degree or postgraduate course, your tuition fee is covered by your placements. Our financial support package includes access to loans, bursaries and TfL discounts, as well as recommendations for flexible paid work and affordable accommodation.

Download our prospectus

We run two programmes per year, kicking off in Spring and Autumn. Upcoming dates:

• 31st August 2020 – 2nd July 2021
• February 2021 – December 2021

Year Here is a social enterprise, meaning that we exist to bring about positive change in society rather than to maximise shareholder profits.

In 2021, we plan to launch the Year Here Foundation, which will aim to ensure that social leadership is a pathway open to the widest pool of talent possible.