Save the children

Save the Children Impact Investment Fund

Primary impact area	Impact area	Geographic location of impact	Investment commencement	SDG alignment
Social	Education & employment	Australia and Asia Pacific	2020

The Save the Children Impact Investment Fund invests in high impact enterprises that address pressing social and humanitarian issues for children and emphasise
social innovation.

The Fund was established in 2020 and provides equity and debt investments to enterprises and initiatives that achieve outcomes in relation to healthcare, education, and child protection.

By investing through the Fund, this investment also aims to address the following areas and outcomes:

Healthcare – by aiming to reduce the number of children under five dying from preventable and treatable illnesses;

Child protection – by aiming to reduce the number of children exposed to violence; and

Education – by aiming to increase the number of children with access to education.

By investing in education technology, e-health and fintech innovations in Australia and Asia-Pacific, the Fund will also enable education and improve the lives of disadvantaged children and families.

This is Save the Children’s first impact investment fund. The impact fund builds on Save the Children’s not-for-profit experience and is an innovation in financing for impact. Save the Children was first established as a non-profit organisation in 1919 and has since been focused on improving the lives of children around the world.

Save the Children Australia is both the Trustee and an investor in the Save the Children Australia Impact Investment Fund. Through Premiums4Good, QBE is an anchor investor in the fund and is also represented on the Investment Committee.

Additionally, QBE is proud to support Save the Children’s work through a global disaster relief and resilience partnership through the QBE Foundation.

“With QBE’s support as an anchor investor through Premiums4Good and as a strategic partner, we’re able to work towards our ambitious goals for the advancement and protection of children’s rights and wellbeing. With increasing and rapid changes in the social and humanitarian space, we believe traditional approaches need to be augmented by agile and creative ways to solve the world’s social and humanitarian problems. The demand for our services has been unprecedented, particularly with severe disasters increasing and now the pandemic. This means we must find new sources of funding for social innovation, including leveraging private sector investment, including closing our first fund.”

- Paul Ronalds, CEO, Save the Children Australia

Case study: Ngutu College

The Save the Children Impact Investment Fund’s first investment is Ngutu College located in Woodville North, South Australia.

Ngutu College is redesigning the concept of schooling and is providing an equitable, culturally informed, and child-centred education to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, children with disabilities and children from low socio-economic backgrounds.

Andrew Plastow, an innovative educator and Aboriginal community leader, founded the college. His aim at the school is to create an experiential environment, which seamlessly integrates Aboriginal knowledge and the arts into a program that is compliant with the formal Australian curriculum.

Ngutu College was founded on the view that quality primary and secondary education forms the foundation for a positive lifetime of education, employment and health outcomes. This approach aligns with UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including SDG 4 on quality education and SDG 10 on reduced inequalities.

Through its learning programs, Ngutu College also aims to acknowledge and engage the individuality of all children and young people. This aligns with research which suggests that high levels of school engagement are important for improved learning outcomes and that students who have emotional and cognitive engagement with school — which includes a sense of belonging, perseverance, motivation, and self-esteem — can make the most of available opportunities, irrespective of their ‘level of aptitude’.¹

Indigenous Year 12 or equivalent attainment rates have improved across all the states and territories over the past decade. The largest increase has been in South Australia, which moved from 42.7% in 2006 to 64.3% in 2016.²

The college opened its doors to students in January 2021 and has enrolled 104 students. Of the 104 students at Ngutu College, 34% are Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders and 48% of students have disabilities. 70% of students come from families in Australia’s two lowest socio-economic quartiles.

¹OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development)(2017). Starting Strong 2017: Key OECD Indicators on Early Childhood Education and Care, Starting Strong OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/978926427116-en

² Closing the Gap (2018) available at here.

Source: Premiums4Good Investment Impact Report 2020-2021