Leadership for Social Change

My course MLD 683 – Leadership for Social Change – focuses on: 1) the nature and character of change leaders, 2) writing effectively for social change, 3) social marketing techniques to help define, refine, and market a social change project.

Look at some sample projects below.

Students propose a social change project that finds a niche in a currently existing organization in order to extend or improve that organization, or propose starting their own organization.  Though a class project, some of these proposals—like Chicago Family Directions below—have gone on to become reality, or continue to maintain wonderful potential for becoming reality.

Go to the Lead Post in a series on the influential essay “The Servant as Leader.”

 Watch a Video Overview of the course and syllabus.  (Link is live when there is a current video to share.)

 Get links to other social change videos, these from an “enterprise” perspective, Here.

 

Social Change Projects

 

Here are some examples of social change projects from this class:

 

 

—Links go live when material becomes available—

 Dennis Nyhan and Melanie Murphy’s Chicago Family Directions project, which established a 501 (c)(3) organization to tutor homeless and underprivileged kids.  Go to www.chicagofamilydirections.org, and read more Here.

 Jeremy Gudauskas’ The Union Network project, which lays the ground work for creating more concert venues combining great musical entertainment, film, and art with spiritual and social change concerns.  Learn more about The Union.

 Susan Davis’ Curbing Cigarette Litter project. This is the Power Point she used to present her ideas for cleaning up Naperville, IL, to the City Council.

 Cathy Taylor’s Water Conservation project, which proposes to make her condo association a more environmentally conscious place to live.

 Lory Watson and Lisa Link’s Chiari Malformation project, which advances a foundation addressing this rare but important disease.

 Jenette Sturges’ McCarty-Burlington Neighborhood project, which seeks to revive a neighborhood council…and the neighborhood itself.

 Chad Pedigo’s project for The Bridge Community.  Called “Friend Raising,” it seeks to create more awareness of the organization’s work and build a long-term community of volunteers and supporters.

Abbey Collin’s Pack Party project to help kids get other kids involved with the Feed My Starving Children organization.

 Lois Durso’s efforts to change the trucking industry, begun as a project in Leadership for Social Change, was reported on by CBS 2 news.

Nadia Kanhai’s project to divest from fossil fuels provides tools for students to get involved and take leadership themselves.

 Tim Albert’s project on digital citizenship proposed a high school class to help students think and deal deeply with the digital world we’re all deeply immersed in, often without knowing how to navigate it and keep it from taking over our lives.

 Matt Gambs’ “Change a Life Scholarship Fund” connects two church parishes to provide greater educational opportunities for all students. Go to the CLSF website for details, a video, and to get involved.

 Krystina Leyva’s project about the Immigrant Youth Justice League, which encourages undocumented youth to come out of the shadows.

  Bea Rodriguez’s project was a full-blown, major conference on women and entrepreneurship.  See the Conference Program.

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