For those who have not heard, Phyllis M. Taylor gifted $15 million back in fall semester to establish the Phyllis M. Taylor Center for Social Innovation and Design Thinking (for more information on this gift, read this article here). More recently, Kenneth Schwartz, dean of the Tulane University School of Architecture, has been named founding director. All just in time to prepare to host AshokaU next spring semester!
Since then, Tulane has decided to centralize all social innovation programming and academics in the center, moving CELT-SI from CELT to the Taylor Center. I checked in with Julia Lang who works as the Senior Administrative Program Coordinator at the Taylor Center to ask her thoughts on the move. She sees the Taylor Center as being “the ‘one stop shop’ for any student interested in getting involved [in social innovation], be it applying for seed funding to launch a new venture (we grant over $25,000 each year!), attend an innovative conference in a foreign country (all students are eligible for a $1,500 experiential learning award), or apply for our $2,500 award to prototype an innovative idea. Students will know where to go if they want to get involved in the interdisciplinary Social Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship Minor, which is open to students from any school and is the fastest growing minor on campus, register for a Design Thinking Bootcamp, seek career guidance, get connected to one of our eight endowed professors of Social Entrepreneurship from across campus, or join a socially innvoative Student Organization, such as TEDxTU, Tulane Effective Altruism, or KivaU, to name a few.”
As students demand more social innovation programming and academic courses, Tulane has realized the need for a central social innovation hub, like the Taylor Center. However, this transition won’t come without a few obstacles. Julia points out that they will be “ironing out and expanding our co-curricular and academic opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students and [they] are faced with the great challenge, but also the great opportunity, to learn how to best work together, modify, and strengthen our programs to better serve students, staff, faculty, and community members.”
To help manage all of these exciting moves, CELT-SI is hiring 8 FELLOWS for next year. I’ve already wrote a post about being a marketing fellow so keep an eye out for my future posts in the series. It’ll be an exciting time to be a part of this transition and you’ll have a chance to truly impact the social innovation landscape on campus for years to come!