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Measuring the Size, Scope & Scale of the Social Enterprise Sector in Manitoba
Full text linkThis project surveyed social enterprises in Manitoba during the spring and summer of 2011 to
develop clear indicators of their size, market activities, and socio‐economic contributions. In
this study, a social enterprise is defined as a business venture, owned or operated by a nonprofit
organization that sells goods or provides services in the market to create a blended
return on investment; financial, social, environmental, and cultural. Using this definition,
researchers identified 266 operating social enterprises in Manitoba. Of the 266 social
enterprises that received the survey, 118 responded. Indicators of socio‐economic contribution
included sales and revenue, expenditures, employment, volunteer engagement, and clients
served and trained. Respondents were asked to report results of the 2010 financial year. The
following report is a summary of the survey findings.
Prior to revealing the survey findings, this paper provides a brief history of the innovative
approaches to community economic development that have been used in Manitoba. The
province’s roots in community‐based economic models laid the foundation for Manitoba’s
current social enterprises, which are found to be a diverse sector, composed of businesses
meeting a range of poverty reduction, social, cultural or environmental goals. The survey results
suggest that in 2010, the 118 responding social enterprises generated at least 41.5 million generated through sales. Responding social
enterprises paid at least 20,000 in wages and salary per full‐time equivalent employee.
Additionally, social enterprises trained 6,890 individuals, generated 5,870 volunteer
opportunities, and provided services to an average of 4,200 people. This paper builds a strong case for stakeholders, community, funder, and government, to collaboratively value these distinct contributions and to support hospitable environments for social enterprises.BC‐Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA), Canadian Community Economic Development Network (CCEDNet), Manitoba Social Enterprise Working Group, Assiniboine Credit Union, United Way of Winnipeg, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Mount Royal Universit
Graduate students' experiences with research ethics in conducting health research
Full text linkGraduate students typically first experience research ethics when they submit their masters or doctoral research projects for ethics approval. Research ethics boards in Canada review and grant ethical approval for student research projects and often have to provide additional support to these novice researchers. Previous studies have explored curriculum content, teaching approaches, and the learning environment related to research ethics for graduate students. However, research does not exist that examines students’ actual experience with the research ethics process. Qualitative description was used to explore the research ethics review experience of eleven masters and doctoral students in health discipline programs.
Data analysis revealed four themes: curriculum, supervisor support, the ethics application process, and students’ overall experience. The results of this research suggest ideas for enhancing curriculum, deepening students’ relationships with supervisors, and developing the role of research ethics boards to support education for novice researchers. This study contributes to comprehension of the research ethics experience for graduate students’ and what they value as new researchers
Scaling Up: The Convergence of Social Economy and Sustainability - Sellsheet
No full textThe book presented in this sellsheet and recently published by Athabasca University Press examines the potential of the social economy to transform the systems that make our current ways of life unsustainable. The book draws extensively from research conducted by members of the BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA) and others over the 2006-2012 period. It is co-edited by BALTA researchers: Dr. Michael Gismondi of Athabasca University, Dr. Mary Beckie of the University of Alberta, Dr. Sean Connelly of Otago University (New Zealand) and Dr. Mark Roseland of Simon Fraser University. Other BALTA associated researchers who contributed chapters were: John Restakis of the B.C. Co-operative Association, Dr. Julie MacArthur of the University of Auckland, Dr. Lynda Ross and Juanita Marois of Athabasca University, George Penfold and Terri MacDonald of Selkirk College, Noel Keough and Erin Swift-Leppäkumpu of the University of Calgary, Sean Markey and Freya Kristensen of Simon Fraser University, and Stewart Perry of the Canadian Centre for Community Renewal.BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA) ; Athabasca University Pres
How Germany's State Development Bank Finances Energy Transition
No full textThis report was produced in 2013 for the Financing Transition Research Cluster of the Scaling Innovation for Sustainability Project of the BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA).In recognition of the long term consequences of relying on a fossil fuel economy, the German government launched a national plan in 2010 to transition away from non-renewable energy sources. The German state development bank, Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), enables energy transition through financing both the development of renewable energy production and energy conservation. The report looks at the German public bank financing model and potential applications to the Canadian context.BC-Alberta Social Economy Research Alliance (BALTA) ; Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canad
The Future of E-Learning
No full textPreprint for:Jon Dron and Terry Anderson (2016) The Future of E-learning. In the SAGE Handbook of E-learning Research (2016) Second Edition. Edited by Caroline Haythornthwaite, Richard Andrews, Jude Fransman and Eric M. Meyers. SageThis is not the first attempt to predict the future of e-learning and our first confident prediction is that it will not be the last. Our intent in this chapter is to focus less on the digital technologies involved and more on broad trends and consequences, especially as they affect and are affected by the pedagogies and their surrounding educational infrastructures. We do not wish to predict the future so much as to characterize its general form and examine the implications for the present and the futures that emerge
Barriers to Participation in the Unleashing Local Capital Project
Full text linkUnleashing Local Capital (ULC) was initiated and is managed by the Alberta Community and Co-operative Association (ACCA). The project empowers rural Alberta communities to invest locally, direct their own economic development and reduce dependency on government supports by directing outward-bound investments towards local businesses, keeping local capital flowing through local communities. ULC educates communities on how to establish an Opportunity Development Co-operative (ODC) – a co-op that pools and manages capital raised from local investors, which is then invested in local businesses. ULC has also directly supported the development of ODCs in several communities. This report is the result of formative evaluation for ACCA of the early development of ULC.Athabasca University ; Alberta Community and Co-operative Associatio
Resistance is Futile: On the Under-Representation of Unions in Science Fiction
Full text linkThis article surveys science fiction (SF) since 1980, and queries the conspicuous under-representation of recognizable images of unions in popular SF, which includes, in contrast, numerous images and narratives of corporate business. According to theories of unionism, science fiction studies and Mark Fisher’s theory of “capitalist realism,” the co-authors theorize this pattern of under-representation, and, in the process, identify and analyze a very small but diverse body of SF works from this period that do include images of unions, in ways that range from the symptomatic to the radically suggestive
Institutions and Interpellations of the Dubject, the Doubled and Spaced Self
Full text linkThis essay develops the idea of the dubject as a model of remediateda subjectivity. It will discuss some theoretical and institutional contexts of the dubject, and then will consider digital manifestations of the dubject with reference to how popular digital applications interpellate the user (see Althusser 1971)—that is, how they impose specific ideological and institutional conditions and limitations on applications and on users’ possibilities for self-representation. This work is an attempt to think digital identity and agency in the context of postcoloniality, as a complement to the more prevalent approach to mediated identity in terms of postmodernity. This work thus builds my larger research project of applying postcolonialist critique to popular culture, particularly that of Canada’s majority white settler society
Contracts and Country Food: the Role of the Hudson’s Bay Company Fort Hunter in the Peace River, Northern Alberta, 1818-1830s
No full textSynergia Institute – 3 Week Study Program - Transition to Co-operative Commonwealth: Pathways to a New Political Economy
No full textSynergia will be organizing its first face-to-face program at the Synergia Summer Institute, September 4 - 23, 2016, at Monte Ginezzo in Tuscany. Transition to Co-operative Commonwealth - Pathways to a New Political Economy, is an intensive 3-week program that will cover Synergia's key online course subjects and feature many of our course developers and collaborators as instructors and workshop leaders. The course unites the global with the local through the diffusion of ideas, models, and practices that advance game-changing solutions in the following key areas: • Co-operative Capital & Social Finance; Alternative Currencies • Co-op & Commons-Based housing & Land Tenure; Community Land Trusts • Renewable Energy; Community-owned energy systems • Local & Sustainable food systems; Community Supported Agriculture • User-controlled health & social care; Social & Community Service Co-ops • Co-operative and Commons Governance • Platform Co-operatives, Digital Commons & Peer-to-Peer productions systems • Convergence and the New Political Economy; Principles, Propositions, and Practices This document provides the detailed Synergia program for further information about content, the program structure, instructors, fees and other details.Synergi