Les Talents d’Alphonse, a collaborative intergenerational platform, aims at connecting generations by facilitating paid services between young and older persons
Les Talents d’Alphonse was created to encourage the development of services and experience sharing activities between generations while at the same time fighting social exclusion of elderly persons.
The platform was created in 2016. It gathers elderly persons willing to share their knowledge and experiences, parents willing to offer courses to their children and young persons wishing to learn from others. Through the platform, users can propose their services or look for their desired ones by choosing a type of service and taping their post code.
Different types of services are available on the platform, from sewing and languages courses to baby-sitting. Les Talents d’Alphonse proposes a single tariff for its services in order to:
• keep the intergenerational affordable for parents
• provide a fair allowance to elderly persons, for whom it can be an additional financial resource
The objective is to keep elderly persons active in their territory by serving others but also to valorise their knowledges and life experiences. On the other hand, intergenerational courses or baby-sitting are highly profitable for young persons but also to their parents, since such services are sometimes rare in rural areas.
Resources needed
The platform was created by two persons. Its team now includes ten persons including interns. The platform also benefits from financial support from a wide range of organisations from private foundations, silver economy stakeholders and French municipalities.
Evidence of success
More than 17 150 hours of classes or baby-sitting have already been accumulated thanks to the platform. More than 1000 seniors have registered on the platform to offer their time and knowledge.
Potential for learning or transfer
Staying active being a major concern for elderly persons, an online platform to connect generations and exchange knowledge is an interesting social innovation. In rural areas, such a good practice can answer at the same time different challenges. On one hand, it helps fighting social exclusion of elderly persons and encourages them to stay active at local level. On the other hand, young persons can benefit from intergenerational experiences and from the knowledge of their elders. Moreover, such a platform helps finding a service in rural areas.
This platform could be replicate in other countries at national level, since intergenerational learning is a developing market.
Moreover, such a platform is highly transferable to countries where pension rates are too low and create the need for additional financial resources or where elderly persons retire early and wish to stay active.
