Portal talk:Social entrepreneurship/About

In South Africa there have been several meetings, workshops etc. conceptualising this initiative. See Historical Notes.

Much of the thinking is embedded in the structure of the portal.

In moving forward, we need to consolidate our vision and mission.

Discussing the Vision

We started with something like:

Enabling communities to enhance their quality of life sustainably 
while facilitating student learning on social entrepreneurship

Here is an alternative we could try to merge? -

Communities are engaged with the programme which is 
catalysing sustainable quality of life improvement

In both of these, Communities are emphasised. Usually we are referring to communities in rural or other developing contexts, but we could also be referring to communities of educators, students, or other parties collaborating towards this common vision of enhancing quality of life sustainably.

We could also consider a more specific vision centred around this portal (which hopefully will have the desired effects of the broader vision above).

The portal is serving its purpose:
Communities express their needs and offerings
Equal partnerships abound to meet these needs
Students gain from the experience, 
receive comensurate academic credits, and
engage enthusiastically.
Diverse communities are collaborating effectively
etc.

Add something like:

Aspiring social entrepreneurs (students) gain some of
the qualities of effective social entrepreneurs through
experiential learning during the course(s).

The qualities emerge as personal characteristics and qualities beyond factual knowledge and practical skills - Ktucker 01:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC).

Discussing the Mission

See Historical Notes and discuss right here.

The mission of this online community:

• Establish a "network of universities" focussed on social entrepreneurship
  • Enhance social entrepreneurial practice across these institutions
• Create an online space for
  • students to interact and share experiences
  • educators to co-develop and share learning resources
  • students to find community based organisations to work with
  • communities to express their needs and aspirations
  • ...

Core Values

• Core Values

See also:

• the discussion at a meeting in April 2008.