Speaker Series and Events

Each year the Centre for Community Research, Learning and Action (CCRLA) chooses an area of focus that relates to our vision and mission with an aim to explore a specific issue and more deeply understand the terms and concepts associated with broad trends.

Collaborating for Change

To reach a wider and diverse audience, CCRLA partnered with Laurier Students' Public Interest Research Group (LSPIRG) and Social Innovation and Venture Creation (SIVC) to co-present the event Theories of Change.

Speakers

• Catherine Fife, MPP
• Joe Mancini, The Working Center
• Jessica Bolduc, 4R Youth Movement
• Dave Meslin, Waterloo Region Crime Prevention Council
• Christiane Saedler, Waterloo Region Crime Prevention Council
• James Orbinski, CIGI Research Chair in Global Health at the Balsillie School of International Affairs

Social Innovation, Social Change and Social Justice

Social innovation and social entrepreneurship are hot topics nationally, internationally, and right here at home and at Laurier. But what do these terms really mean? There seem to be multiple definitions, depending on who it is you ask.

As we increasingly embrace these concepts and approaches, we should be asking critical questions:

• For what and whom are we are innovating — and why?
• How are questions of power, inequality, social justice and human rights being addressed?
• Is social innovation a strategy for a better world? Or is it merely neoliberal agenda in disguise?

At this series, speakers presented alternative understandings of social innovation and social entrepreneurship. Speakers offered critical perspectives on the connections and tensions between social innovation, social entrepreneurship and social justice.

Speakers

• Jessica Bolduc, “Intersections between Social Innovation and Indigenous Knowledge.”
• Brian Christens, “Community Power, Empowerment, and Models of Capacity Building.”
• Laura Mae Lindo, “Doing Diversity Work Differently – L.O.L (Learning.Out.Loud) at the Diversity and Equity Office.”
• Sean Geobey, “Visions, Reflections and Hallucination: The Social Imagination in Innovation.”
• Barry Colbert, “Sustainability Conversations and the Dynamics of Multi-Sector Collaboration: How Does Change Happen?"
• Alicia Sliwinski, "The Hope Trope in Social Entrepreneurship: A view from the mainstream."
• Ginette Lafrenière, "Social Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship: A Stimulus for Social Justice Work?"
• Karli Ferriolo and Brandon Hey, “Social Justice and Social Innovation: Complementary Approaches to Creating a Sustainable, Just, and Equitable Society.”

What is Knowledge?

• Rick Hill: Hodinohson:ni knowledge and wisdom
• inREACH
• Robb Travers
• Nicole Nelson, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Department of the History of Science/Department of Medical History and Bioethics
• Brenda Murphy and Annette Chretien
• Liz Weaver