My name is Nasrin Islam, and I am from Bangladesh by origin.

Coming from a culture where

women face difficulties and deprivation despite creativity and hard work, I often tried to
distinguish myself from other girls by focusing on my academic and extra-curricular activities.

I was involved in entrepreneurial research for the past few years but becoming a real-life
entrepreneur was never my dream. My mindset toward entrepreneurship has developed
tremendously during my Master's study on Entrepreneurship, Sustainability, and Social Change.
From my ongoing MSc program, I have learned that innovation is the prominent component of
social entrepreneurship to promote sustainable development. The diversity of this program
attracted me and up till now I have been able to grasp wide knowledge in areas focused on
Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and sustainable development.

In the wide area of sustainable development, SDG 3 target is to “reduce by one-third premature
mortality from non-communicable diseases through prevention and treatment and promote mental
health and well-being” (WHO, 2021). Keeping this issue in mind and due to my passion, I wanted
to start an organization for well-being and yoga for quite some time. I have had the opportunity to
discuss this venture with the students at Linnaeus University as well as counselors on different
occasions. This business idea was first publicly introduced at a workshop led by Akatingo
International “Creating cross-sectoral dialogue for a sustainable society”, as part of Global
Entrepreneurship Week-2022. The students who participated in the workshop were presented with
my idea of a venture and provided their feedback. Through this workshop, I identified that the
demand for wellness is present among the students of Linnaeus, especially women. The female
students stated that they often feel left alone with their problems, such as period pain or mental
distress. Moreover, being an international student, an immigrant, or a refugee always comes with
hardships. According to a Ukrainian student, being here has made her feel “homeless”, and she
feels that her reality is fractured. Many international students share this feeling of not belonging
anywhere; having left their home country and being an imposter into this new society. Also, some
students come from countries with ongoing armed conflicts, tormented by corruption, climate
disasters, socioeconomic inequalities, and other calamities. The students whom I have spoken with
explained how the situation at home still affects them and results in daily worry.

Accordingly, this idea was evaluated based on the data from the workshops I participated in. After
getting that validation, I was motivated forward to establish an organization that would primarily
focus on mental health issues, while covering other aspects of the problems that an international
student could face. At this stage, Andre Bogsjö from Drivhuset helped me as my dialogue partner.
He provided the necessary guidance and information to develop the organization. Eventually, I
arranged three days of Mental Health Week to address this issue among students, faculties, and
staff after a 6 months journey in collecting resources and facilities. My focus for this event was to
provide the necessary information and training on how to tackle this problem, especially for
international students at Linnaeus University.
In conclusion, I am still in the preliminary stage of establishing my organization “Voice for Mental
Health”. I am not in a hurry. I would like to research more and look for opportunities so that my
organization could work for the transformation of mental health not only in educational institutions
but also in workplaces.