22. Jul. 2019

The First Social Innovation Assembly took place virtually on June 28, 2019

The First Social Innovation Assembly took place on June 28^th, 2019 as a lightweight virtual format for exchange and communication among social innovation practitioners, facilitators and researchers hosted by Elke Dall (ZSI - Centre for Social Innovation). In this format, whoever wants to present a social-innovation related project or initiative, seek collaborators or announce an event to all interested parties is invited to do so within a 3 minute time slot of a roughly 90 minute online meeting. Listening in without making an active contribution is also welcome.

The Social Innovation Assembly was invented as one of several follow-ups to the SIC project. In its first instantiation, 22 participants were introduced to some 16 projects and initiatives. Specific subjects were social innovations in regional development, cities and rural areas, various learning and training initiatives on social innovation and social entrepreneurship, methods of design thinking and co-creation, European policy to foster social innovation, digital technologies supporting social innovation, housing, poverty, and accessibility of services for people with disabilities. The SIC project also introduced its outputs and sustained activities in policy, learning and research. Thus, the meeting highlighted the relevance of social innovation from the macro-level of policy and strategies to the micro-level of local initiatives and trainings; diverse geographical approaches from the global (cooperation with Latin America) to the local level (social innovation hubs in a specific area of Dublin); diverse possibilities of engagement such as reports available, conferences upcoming, networks being created. Several connections between projects were made during the meeting already through conversations in the chat room. Links and contacts from the meeting are available here.

The next SI Assembly will take place on November 29^th, 10-11.30 am CET and will again be hosted by ZSI – Centre for Social innovation. Again, anyone with an interest in social innovation is welcome to contribute or just listen. Registration is available here.

Related Articles:

• Project: Social Innovation Community
• Event: Social Innovation Assembly I
• Event: Social Innovation Assembly II

Tags: social innovation