Mullingar finalist for Social Entrepreneurs Ireland award

A young Mullingar man has been selected as one of the finalists for the for the Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Awards 2018.

Simon McGough has been chosen as one of the 17 finalists for his project, Cohabit.

Cohabit empowers communities who wish to provide affordable home ownership to middle income families and the over 65s. No mechanism currently exists to address this market need, which affects a majority of the Irish population.

Of the 17, up to eight will go on to receive an initial €200,000 in funding and support for their projects for social change with potential for further investment and development opportunities.

Simon said: “For Cohabit it’s a huge deal to be a finalist in the Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Awards.

“Winning an award would enable us to bring the co-housing development model to communities across Ireland, to the benefit of middle-income families and older people.

“Hopefully we can start to see a change in the way in which we finance and develop new homes in Ireland.”

Cohabit and the 16 other applicants now enter the final stages of the selection process, having pitched their projects to panels of judges in the hope of winning a place on the Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Awards programme.

The highly competitive programme offers critical funding and mentorship opportunities to high-potential social entrepreneurs to enable them to scale the impact of their projects. The 17 finalists have come through a rigorous process with 102 applicants competing for eight places on the programme.

The award winners will be announced at the Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Awards Ceremony in the Mansion House on October 9.