Evolutionary education for social innovation
From lived challenges to locally owned solutions.
SENTA helps young people in Eastern DR Congo find their strengths, learn practical skills, and turn the problems they live with into social enterprises. Enterprises that give people work and serve their communities.
Young people are not only affected by the problems around them. They can build the solutions.
Eastern DR Congo is full of young people with ideas, talent and real experience. Many of them have little access to practical education, jobs, networks and resources.
SENTA is a different kind of learning space. Young people work on themselves first. Then they study the problems around them, test ideas, learn from failure and work with mentors. They take responsibility for building the solution, because the people closest to a problem are often the best placed to solve it.
Why SENTA exists
A cycle, not a straight line: Ownership → Learning → Action.
We don’t expect a young person to arrive with a business plan. We ask them to start with themselves.
01. Discover yourself
Before building an enterprise, young people get to know themselves: their strengths, their purpose, their values. We do this through reflection, leadership and mindset work.
02. Understand the problem
Scholars learn to listen, question their assumptions and understand what the community really needs. Nobody jumps straight to a solution.
03. Build, test & grow
Ideas become experiments, then prototypes, then enterprises. Mentors, coaches and networks stay with them all the way.
Personal development, enterprise, mentorship, incubation, community.
Personal development & leadership
Self-awareness, confidence, critical thinking, communication and leadership.
Social entrepreneurship
Finding real community problems and building lasting solutions for them.
Mentorship & coaching
Mentors and practitioners who question your assumptions and make your ideas stronger.
Incubation & venture development
Hands-on support from idea to prototype, to market test, to a first small enterprise.
Community & networks
We connect scholars with alumni, mentors, partners and investors, so opportunities keep coming.
Grounded numbers, not projections.
We’d rather show fewer figures we can stand behind than a long list we can’t. See our full impact page for definitions and sources.
When conditions changed in 2025, SENTA adapted and kept going.
In 2025, conflict disrupted normal life in Bukavu. With support from SINA, we moved our program to Kampala for a while, so scholars and staff could stay safe. Twenty-four young people completed a three-month residential program, and 15 enterprise ideas came out of that cohort.
Today, SENTA keeps building in Bukavu and keeps following the ventures that grew out of the training.
See our impactLocal enterprises, born from problems people know firsthand.
SENTA scholars are working on health, food and nutrition, recycling, beauty and wellness, and more.
Natural Uhai Food
Dietary products made from local ingredients that help prevent and stabilize diabetes.
Inspired Hands
Eco-bags made from plastic waste, creating dignified jobs for women in the community.
Décorespo
Thermo-compressed boards made from plastic waste, used for eco-friendly furniture.
“We help young people move from looking for opportunities to creating them.”
SENTA, our approach
Connected to a wider community.
SENTA was founded in Bukavu by young Congolese who ran into the limits of conventional education and found another way to learn at the Social Innovation Academy (SINA) in Uganda. Today SENTA is one of the SINA communities: a network of independent, self-organized communities built on responsibility and social entrepreneurship.
A Congo where young people create opportunities.
For themselves, and for others. That’s what we’re building toward, and there’s a place in it for you.