Page 125 - Microsoft Word - The Future of Learning April 2017.docx

Social entrepreneurs are individuals and teams that develop innovative ideas and concepts that are then turned into solutions to meet communities’ most pressing social and environmental problems. Ashoka157 is one of the world’s largest networks of social entrepreneurs with over 3,000 volunteers creating new products, systems, environments and media to increase the independence of communities and ensure they can become increasingly self-managing.
Learners want to, and can, make a difference no matter what their age. Our role is to build that belief and empower each learner to make a difference in other people’s lives and environments.
To be innovative and ingenious, learners require a range of new strategies when they:
• cannot find the physical, financial or intellectual resource that they require
• lack motivation and perseverance to begin and complete the tasks required
• cannot think of a possible solution to the need or opportunity
• do not get along, or cannot agree, with other team members (collaboration)
• lack the project time management capability or a specific production, thinking skill or
capability
• are unsure of how to accurately test and market their prototype, product, system, environment or media.
Back to our example: (Stage 5: INNOVATION and INGENUITY)
Our roving educator thinks that maybe they could live in one of the villages in Spain and
manage your business from there. On the internet, no one knows where or who you are, and if it turns out to be a nice place to live then why not combine the quality of life with a good income? A concept framework created from a single and quite innocent question has opened-up new opportunities. Such is the power of our ability to learn, be creative and do something that is drawn from our passions. Being passionate is not enough, though. Passion must be matched by capability, as well as making sure there is a need for what it is that we are passionate about at a price that people are willing to pay, or not.
Resource 56: Stage 5 of the Learning Process
The remainder of the journey can be referred to as the technology, or design, process; a sub-set of the Learning Process. This process requires the art of taking creative ideas, concepts and concept frameworks and turning them into something that people want to apply, use, purchase and then maybe, recommend to others.
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Areas where innovation can be used to meet communities’ needs
Assisting people with a disability
Health care support
Electricity supply
Addressing loneliness
Micro-loans for start-up companies
Sanitation solutions
Low cost technologies
Addressing poverty
Disaster assistance
Care of the elderly
Business advice
Health awareness
Recycling initiatives
Building greater Inter- cultural understanding
Reducing extinction rates
Restoring natural environments
Educating the poor
...?
157 Ashoka. Social Entrepreneurship. (2015) Retrieved from https://www.ashoka.org