The British Council and Education for Good convened an Inter-University Social Entrepreneurship Taskforce in Hong Kong that will provide a platform for local universities to learn from each other’s experiences and from global best practice in integrating social entrepreneurship and social innovation into their courses and programmes.
Comprising academics and researchers from Hong Kong’s eight government-funded universities as well as an international advisory board of members from the UK, USA, Germany and India, the Inter-University Social Enterprise Taskforce – the first of its kind in the territory – will collaborate on initiatives to nurture social entrepreneurship through their curricula and identify research opportunities with UK and other overseas universities.
The taskforce has these terms of reference:
- To facilitate collaboration and synergetic effort of members from local universities in developing learning, teaching and research in social entrepreneurship and social innovation.
- To provide a bridge and a platform for members of local universities to reach out and learn from leading overseas scholars and practitioners in this field.
- To foster inter-university and cross-disciplinary research, teaching and learning.
- To foster cross-sector collaborations among universities, corporates, NGOs, social enterprises, the government and other organisations.
The international advisory board comprises academic experts on social enterprise, social impact measurement and social innovation. Alex Nicholls, Professor of Social Entrepreneurship within the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Oxford is from the UK. Other international advisors are Professor Andreas Heinecke from European Business School, Professor Christopher Gergen from Duke University, Professor Scott Sherman from Stanford University and Ms Marina Kim from Ashoka University.
The taskforce was officially launched on 6 November 2014, with Professor Peter Mathieson, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hong Kong, providing the inauguration speech. Professor Mathieson expressed his personal interest in learning more about social enterprise and in how the taskforce will progress.
The eight government-funded universities are City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University, Lingnan University, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, The Hong Kong Institute of Education, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, The University of Hong Kong.