This free 6 week course is for anyone who wants to make a difference. Whether you are already familiar with the field of social innovation or social entrepreneurship, working for an organization that wants to increase its social impact, or just starting out, this course will take you on a journey of exploring the complex problems that surround us and how to start thinking about solutions.
We will debunk common assumptions around what resources are needed to begin acting as a social innovator. We will learn from the numerous examples of social innovations happening all over the world. You will be challenged to get out of your comfort zone and start engaging with the diverse spaces around you. By the end of the course, you will have formed your own approach to social innovation, and you will have begun to develop the concepts, mindset, skills, and relationships that will enable you to start and evolve as a changemaker.
You will be able to purchase a Verified Certificate if you wish to show evidence of your achievements, but this is optional, and you may apply for Financial Aid if you are unable to pay the certificate fee.
The Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship co-created this course with RLabs, a social movement ‘born-and-bred’ in Bridgetown, Cape Town that is now active in 22 countries. The movement empowers youth through innovative and disruptive technology by teaching them vital skills and providing much needed support and a sense of community. Advocating and supporting initiatives such as RLabs forms part of the Bertha Centre’s mandate. The Centre is a specialised unit at University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business, and is the first academic centre in Africa dedicated to advancing social innovation and entrepreneurship.
You can view the course trailer at www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcWYG64WO20
Tweet about this course using the hashtag #socinnMOOC
From the lesson
Changing the system - who me?
Understanding that social innovation is system innovation can help us appreciate why social innovation is so difficult to do. Social innovations can start to challenge and change the underlying system conditions that caused the social or environmental problem in the first place. We are asked to innovate around belief systems, or around authority, power, and resource flows. So, a social innovation challenges the rules of the game. Asking what’s innovative about the work means asking questions around the experiences of where an innovation might be changing the rules of the games and allows us to go deeper into the kinds of impacts that might be possible, and discover hidden impacts. When any kind of social innovation starts to get at the systemic roots, we’re going to be provoking anxiety. So it’s quite helpful to map out the social system and the rules that govern it and then to consider how you are challenging these rules through the innovation.