Notes from AAC&U:
1/26/12
Session #1
Social Entrepreneurship Education
- Paul Rogers, progers2@gmu.edu; English professor – George Mason U
- Michelle Leaman w/ Ashoka,
- Jay Friedlander, College of the Atlantic
- Michele Kahane, Professor of Professional Practice, The New School
Learning Outcomes* for Social Entrepreneurs / Innovators and Changemakers (to be integrated into
various courses throughout varying content areas) with the intention that:
“...students gain a sense of their potential to act as changemakers, integrating and applying
disciplinary knowledge to address pressing social challenges”
I. Ways of Knowing
a. Understand the field of Social Entrepreneurship. How it differs from
traditional nonprofits and charities, social enterprise, Corporate Social
Responsibility (CSR) philanthropy and service projects. Know the major players,
how the field has changed and where it is headed.
b. Know the community through engagement. Through engagement with social
entrepreneurship organizations and their leaders, get to know the root cause of a
problem, the constraints, community conditions and entrenched interests at play.
II. Ways of Thinking
a. Think in systems. Possess the ability to analyze a problem in the context of a
system and to think about why the system doesn’t work. Be able to make
hypotheses about what would be required to make the system work at the scale of
the problem.
b. Identify problems and define and design solutions. Be able to define a
problem and identify and design solutions that take into account both intended and
unintended consequences.
c. Think creatively. Possess the ability to think creatively, to push thinking beyond
today, the text, the book, the classroom, and to envision a world as it should be.
d. Think with a focus on results. Possess the ability to map activities and tactics
toward short and long-term measurable, tangible results, and to learn continuously
from diverse places and from failures along the way.
III. Ways of Interacting
a. Communicate clearly and convincingly. Be able to create and deliver crisp,
concise communication of a problem and its solution and why one should care and act.
b. Build coalitions and teams. Be able to build strong coalitions and teams through
effective vision-setting, negotiation and communication.
IV. Ways of Being
a. Understand oneself. Awareness of personal passions, motivations, aspirations,
abilities and limitations, paired with a commitment to work on improving oneself
as a changemaker.
b. Sense of purpose and self-permission. Awareness of change one wants to see in
the world and self-permission to take risks to pursue it
* from Ashoka U
“Taking awful problems and reimagining them to allow for creative solutions.”
Focus on:
Creative thinking / solution making,
i.e. reimagining what an item’s “value” might be – have from students from varying
contents look at something like a cardboard box and brainstorming all of the ways it
could be used, and then marketing it around it’s potential
Risk taking / failing / trying again
Change making and change makers
Social Entrepreneurship is not just a “business” model:
Ex:
Florence Nightingale
John Muir
Jane Addams
It allows for the examination of “the nature of problems” as being a watershed. Students can
examine “everything that contributes to the problem” (i.e. politics, economics, nature, etc) and
how they are intertwined like tributaries. In contrast, the traditional academic approach is to
examine problems in isolation as they relate to the topic of a particular content. These two
views look like:
Social entrepreneurial lens
Traditional academic lens
Frame assignments around “big problems” but with the optimism of “creative solution makers”
In Comp 101:
Frame writing assignments around elements that are essential to change makers: (empathetic,
systems thinking, coalition building, persistent optimism, entrepreneurial, extraordinary
communication skills)
 Empathy Essay
 Research paper on a “big problem” that includes comparing and contrasting
different organizations’ solutions to that problem as a way of exploring how it
might be solved. (Ashoka for ex.)
Social entrepreneurship / innovation are necessary because “The social sector is transforming - people
are devising just and sustainable solutions by changing how the systems work.”
Ex:
Fair Trade USA (started by college student Paul Rice
http://www.ashoka.org/fellow/paul-rice
Freelancer’s Union (started by college student Sarah Harrowitz)
http://www.freelancersunion.org/about/board-of-directors.html
Northern Virginia Writer’s Project as engagement opportunity
http://writingcenter.gmu.edu/highschoolwritingcenters/sites.google.com/site/hswritingcenters/resourc
es/nvwp.php
Youth Venture
http://www.genv.net/
http://www.ashoka.org/youthventure
Project Citizen
http://www.civiced.org/index.php?page=we_the_people_project_citizen
Changemaker Innovation Challenges:
http://www.changemakers.com/citizenmedia
Technology and social change
http://techchange.org/
David Bornstein – author - How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas
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Notes - Session #2
Ken Banes – author – What the Best College Professors Do – 2004 (I ordered this...)
“What makes a great teacher great? Who are the professors students remember long after graduation?
This book, the conclusion of a fifteen-year study of nearly one hundred college teachers in a wide variety
of fields and universities, offers valuable answers for all educators.
The short answer is—it’s not what teachers do, it’s what they understand. Lesson plans and lecture notes
matter less than the special way teachers comprehend the subject and value human learning. Whether
historians or physicists, in El Paso or St. Paul, the best teachers know their subjects inside and out—but
they also know how to engage and challenge students and to provoke impassioned responses. Most of all,
they believe two things fervently: that teaching matters and that students can learn.
In stories both humorous and touching, Bain describes examples of ingenuity and compassion, of
students’ discoveries of new ideas and the depth of their own potential. What the Best College Teachers
Do is a treasure trove of insight and inspiration for first-year teachers and seasoned educators.”
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Notes - Session 3
IDEA – Assessment company that produces “student centered course reaction” feedback tools.
I collected samples – we might think about developing new student evaluation of faculty/courses
around their approach or use their stuff.
Notes – Session #4
Authors Alexander W. Astin, Helen S. Astin, - Cultivating the Spirit: How College Can Enhance Students'
Inner Lives
Five indicators of spiritual development
Spiritual quest
Equanimity
Charitable involvement
Ethic of care
Ecumenical worldview
Global citizenship
Spirituality is multifaceted
Involves a “quest” for answering the “big questions”
Global view that transcends ethnocentrism – a willingness to understand other countries,
cultures and belief systems
Sense of caring/compassion and a lifestyle of service
Capacity to “remain calm/centered” within the self
Top college experiences that promote spirituality:
Study aboard
Interdisciplinary courses
Interracial interactions
Service-Learning
Volunteer work
Philanthropic giving
Helping friends with personal problems
Contemplative practices
Meditation
Self-reflection
“Traditional academic discourse focuses on a “business model” of productivity and competition that
leads to materialism and a devaluing of the liberal arts.”