SER provides North American social entrepreneurs and nonprofit enterprise directors with practical news and information, business tools, and inspiration to help you improve the profitability and impact of social purpose ventures.
SEblog
Social enterprise planning tools
Posted July 18th, 2008 by Tom
in
Thought you'd be interested in some new and old texts that are available on the web and could be of assistance to social entrepreneurs planning their next enterprise.
Business Planning for Enduring Social Impact, by Andrew Wolk and Kelley Kreitz
Connecting Green Jobs to Energy Efficient Housing
Posted July 16th, 2008 by Tom
in
Emily Kirsch, Bay Area organizer for the Oakland, CA-based Ella Baker Center's Green Collar Job Campaign, wants to develop the demand for more green jobs by financing retrofits of existing homes. Oakland has approximately 47,000 dwellings, 30% of which have deferred maintenance, and 60% are renter occupied.
By developing the financing and incentives for low-income property owners to retrofit their dwellings and rental units, the EBC hopes to not only lower the city's residential energy consumption, but provide job skills and employment for its Green Collar trainees.
Join the Social Enterprise Working Group
Posted July 7th, 2008 by Tom
in
Will Morgan is facilitating the Social Enterprise Working Group for The Small Enterprise Education and Promotion (SEEP) Network. Will needs your help:
* Sign up for the first online conference "Defining Social Enterprise" (July 15-30) to discuss a SE positioning paper with a broad audience
* Recruit 5-10 of your personal contacts to join this online conference. Send them to The Social Enterprise Working Group online workspace, or forward this post.
* Contribute and discuss specific examples of Social Enterprise programs.
* Decide if SEEP should be a home for a SE program or platform.
Participate during the conference with as much time as you can offer. Both long thought-out comments and short, quick comments help advance discussion and provoke new ideas.
Craigslist Foundation's Nonprofit Nights on Earned Income
Posted May 28th, 2008 by Tom
in
Event: Earned Income for Nonprofits: Strategies for Sustainability
Dates: 7/1
Time: 5:30-9:00pm
Cost: FREE to attendees
Venues: Baruch College
Program:
* 5:30-6:30 – Welcome reception
* 6:30-7:30 – Earned Income for Nonprofits Panel & Q&A
* NYC Panelists include Julius Walls (Greyston Bakery), Dr. Jeffrey Robinson (NYU), and a representative from Zazzle.com
* 7:30-8:15 – Breakout groups
* 8:15-9:00 – Networking
Go to http://www.craigslistfoundation.org/nonprofitnightnyc for more info and to RSVP.
The Mind Trust's Education Entrepreneur Fellowship
Posted May 28th, 2008 by themindtrust
The Mind Trust's Education Entrepreneur Fellowship
A nationally unique incubator for transformative education ventures
The Mind Trust’s Education Entrepreneur Fellowship is a nationally unique incubator for transformative education ventures. The Fellowship offers promising education entrepreneurs the opportunity to develop and launch their break-the-mold education ventures and the support necessary for success. Fellows receive two years of salary, benefits, coaching, customized training, a travel budget and more. With this support, fellows will be able to realize their visions and achieve extraordinary results for some of the nation’s most underserved students.
Adapting to Change
Posted May 21st, 2008 by Tom
in
Green Jobs and Workforce Development in the Clean Energy Economy
These days, everyone is talking about the “green economy,” and labor unions are no exception. The Blue-Green Alliance, an organization that’s jointly led by the US Steelworkers and the Sierra Club, just sponsored a conference in Pittsburgh, PA called “Good Jobs, Green Jobs” that drew some 1,000 participants and covered such topics as scaling up to meet the challenge of the green economy, and green public policies and private investments. On the West Coast, an upcoming conference sponsored by the California Labor Federation’s Workforce and Economic Development Program, “Adapting to Change,” will explore the convergence of climate change policy, the transition to a green economy and growing economic insecurity.
Theater as Social Enterprise
Posted May 18th, 2008 by Tom
Theater as Social Enterprise
Economic life could not have looked more bleak for residents of Colquitt, a southwest Georgia town in early 1991. Many residents lost their jobs after a sewing factory and five family businesses shut down. But Colquitt residents refused to wave a white flag. The non-profit Colquitt/Miller County Arts Council jump-started an effort to resurrect the town’s financial dignity by instituting a profit-generating theater venture.
Building Workforce Partnerships Conference June 11 in LA
Posted May 11th, 2008 by Tom
in
I recently spoke with Andrea Buffa, the new Communications Analyst at the University of California Berkeley Labor Center. The Labor Center has developed a new education and research program on green jobs in California and is assisting with the development of a green jobs workshop track at the June 11-13 Workforce and Economic Development Conference in Los Angeles.
Expected workshop topics include what and where are the jobs; green manufacturing possibilities; job quality and the green economy; and best practices in environmental/labor collaborations; among others. This track, developed in partnership with the Apollo Alliance, and the Ella Baker Center, will explore the extent of retooling and what it means for industry and labor, the opportunity for new employment in “green collar jobs”, and how to build new educational, economic, and social supports to make the transition successful.
The Building Workforce Partnerships conference takes place June 11-13, 2008 at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel Los Angeles.
WED Green Jobs Workshops include (not a complete list):
What and where are the jobs?
-Michael Renner, Worldwatch Institute; or Jill Kubit – Cornell Labor Center
-Janet McGenty, Economic Strategy Panel
-Jennifer Oliver, Director, Greater Silicon Valley Center of Excellence)
-Jason Walsh, GreenforAll
Successful environmental/labor collaborations
-Jose T. Bravo, Executive Director, Just Transition Alliance
-Dave Campbell, Secretary Treasurer, SWA Local 675
-Ricardo Hidalgo, Organizer, International Brotherhood of Teamsters
-tentative: Adrian Martinez, Project Attorney, Natural Resources Defense Council
Training for entry and re-entry populations
Ian Kim, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
Raquel Pinderhughes, San Francisco State University
Sal Vaca, Richmond Build
How our sector is responding to change
-Eric Emblem, Sheet Metal Workers
-Mike Massey, UA – United Associated of Plumbers and Pipefitters
-Von Ton Quinliven, PG&E
Green manufacturing possibilities
-George Sterzinger of the Renewable Energy Policy Project
-and others …
Funding for green job creation
Community College Green Job Training Programs
-Peter Crabtree
Dean of Instruction, Vocational Technology Division, Laney College, Oakland CA
-Roger Ebbage
Director, Northwest Energy Education Institute , Lane Community College, Eugene OR
-Greg Newhouse, Associate Dean/Special Projects Manager, Advanced Transportation Technologies
Mirmar College, San Diego CA
-Reid Strieby, Professor, Bronx Community College CUNY, Bronx NY, Principal Investigator of Environmental Entrepreneurship Program, Center for Sustainable Energy, Bronx Community College
-Moderator: Marcy Drummond, LA Trade and Technical College
How labor can get involved with climate change legislation
-Dave Foster, Blue-Green Allliance (tentative)
-Sharon Anderson, CA Air Resources Board
-Carol Zabin, UC Berkeley Labor Center
-Barbara Byrd, Oregon AFL-CIO
Ensuring Union Jobs in Green Construction
-Myung-Soo, LA Federation of Labor
-tentative: Madeleine Janis, LAANE
Emerald Cities
-Kate Gordon, Apollo Alliance
-Fred Lucero, Richmond BUILD/Solar Richmond
-Elsa Barboza, Strategic Concepts in Organizing and Policy Education (SCOPE), LA Apollo Alliance
-Joan Fitzgerald, Northeastern University, New York University
Jade States
Robb Smith, Massachusetts office of economic development
Wendy Patton, Ohio governor's office
Patrick Neville, Washington State Apollo Alliance
Go to http://www.wed-works.org/info.html for more info.
Tapping Local Innovation: Unclogging the Water and Sanitation Crisis
Posted January 22nd, 2008 by rwohlgemuth
Global Water Challenge and Ashoka’s Changemakers are hosting a global competition searching for the most innovative and sustainable community-based approaches to providing universal access to safe drinking water and sanitation.
“Tapping Local Innovation: Unclogging the Water and Sanitation Crisis” is a collaborative competition to find and discuss groundbreaking approaches that are making universal access to safe water and sanitation a reality. Addressing challenges from the high cost of water in urban areas to creating access to water in rural areas can lead to critical impacts on global health, the environment, poverty, peace and conflict. The competition offers a forum for ideas projects to be shared and reviewed by investors and leaders in the field. Even if you do not offer a proposal of your own, we invite you to join the dialogue. Your experience and insights are invaluable in the creation of truly innovative approaches to providing universal access to safe drinking water and sanitation.
Funding will be made available for the most innovative work currently being done around the world at the close of the competition.
Submit, review and comment on entries starting now through March 26, 2008. Online voting will take place April 16-30 2008 at www.changemakers.net.
America Forward briefing book on social enterprise for government candidates and policy makers
Posted January 10th, 2008 by Tom
As we head into the presidential election year, The Action Tank, a unit of the New Profit social investment firm, is trying to define a new role for government--one that incorporates social entrepreneurship and other innovative ways for government, business and the nonprofit sector to work together on solving public problems.
"Their success [of social entrepreneurs] challenges us to ask how we can make government an investor and catalyst rather than the entity that delivers or controls services."
The Action Tank has created a coalition of leading social entrepreneurs, called America Forward, and recently published a briefing book of the same name. The book includes short profiles of eight innovative high-impact social-sector organizations across the U.S. and proposes:
"a variety of principles and proposals that, if implemented, would help high-performance social entrepreneurs to access capital--both financial and human--and surmount barriers to scale."
Among the more interesting components of the America Forward Architecture is a government sponsored network of Social Investment Funds, a National Public Service Academy followed by five years of civilian service, a Civic Learning agenda, and the creation of a Small Business Administration for the nonprofit sector. This last agenda item has gotten a good boost from Andrew Wolk, CEO at Root Cause, who recently authored the chapter “Social Entrepreneurship and Government: A New Breed of Entrepreneurs Developing Solutions to Social Problems,” just released in The Small Business Economy: A Report to the President by the Small Business Administration (SBA).
