What a Journey it Has Been…

by: Jackie Go

I would like to reflect and share some of the amazing things I have learned during our social innovation course as we developed a solution to homelessness. I have learned so much about the complexities of social problems, the many different perspectives that each person can have on an issue, and I have been hugely inspired by the many people I have met who are  committed to making a difference in their community.

I think it’s really interesting how life sometimes leads you in a certain direction and I find that I was really pushed to explore the homeless issue more this semester. I have always been interested in working to solve homelessness and was the coordinator of the Cold Wet Weather Shelter Program in the first year of its operation at Coquitlam Alliance Church in the winter of 2007.  After that I lived and studied in Vienna, Austria for one year and when I came back to SFU to finish my last term of university, I had no idea that this social innovation course would teach me so much about business, social issues, and how to make change happen. Ever since choosing to explore the issue of homelessness once again in my life, I feel so thankful for the many people who have given their feedback and helped us develop our idea. Our professor helped us get connected with homeless advocates, I knew several from my work with the Cold Weather Program and the more I delved into the project, the more names and people I recognized. I have realized how small a community can really be – especially when we started meeting various members of the community to get feedback on our project. We heard about the Port Coquitlam Mayor’s Action Team on Homelessness (MATH) and when I looked on the list of members, I realized that one of them was one of my high school teachers! What a small world it is indeed, and I was luckily able to make contact with him and invite him to our final class presentation as well. So I have definitely learned about the power of personal networks and networking in order to broaden our reach and get feedback from as many different perspectives as well. I am interested in pursuing a career in corporate social responsibility, and this project has taught me a lot about stakeholder engagement, and the different needs and desires that each unique stakeholder has with regards to their interest in the homelessness issue – from outreach workers interested in getting people out of homelessness, to bankers who want to ensure the financial viability of the project, to potential property investors who want to know how they can get a return on their investment.

One thing that really impressed me was the desire to help the homeless that came from each person that we asked feedback from. I definitely see potential for us to develop a solution using the knowledge and skills of a community of people who want to help the homeless. Creating a link between the different stakeholders and creating a platform for dialogue and sharing ideas in order to develop, modify, and customize the model has been an exciting journey and I hope to continue it as we take advantage of the connections which have already been made. Thank you to everyone for following our blog – your support and encouragement have been invaluable.

What Have We Learned

By: Arita Liu

Throughout the past three weeks, our team has been actively doing research and meeting with experts to discover issues of and search for solutions for homelessness. What we learned through our exploration process can fall into following four scopes.

Understand homeless situation in Tri-Cities

Homelessness is a complicated social problem. Each city differs in its homeless problems due to geographical, economical and cultural factors. Tri-Cities homelessness is distinguished with the fact that there is no permanent shelter in the area yet church plays an important role in providing temporary shelters and connecting homeless individuals with available services and resources. The reality that a permanent shelter is nowhere closer calls for alternative innovative housing opportunities.

Touched by community involvement

Last Wednesday we were in the food hamper provided by SHARE Family & Community Services Society in Trinity United Church. We had a chance to see how the church worked with community volunteers to organize and deliver the service and how the food hamper is a socializing event for the homeless families and individuals. It is a very special experience to witness the bond of the community in helping the homeless people. Through interviewing two volunteers, one of them used to be homeless and addictive to drugs, we get to hear homeless citizens’ voice on their needs and perspectives, which is valuable in helping us to adjust the solution to meet their needs.

Perceive from multiple perspectives

In the process of searching for an innovative solution to homelessness, we contacted experts from the real estate. They provided financial and economical advise on our solution and raised issues from their perspective for us to consider in developing the model. Hearing opinions from business professionals is inspiring because it makes us realize that people from different fields with different perspectives can share a same vision and collaborate with each other to solve a problem. Cross- sector collaboration and partnership may bring about some really innovative solutions by exchanging ideas and values and mobilizing social resources.

Apply knowledge to practice

It is amazing that we are given an opportunity to actually apply the knowledge we learned from the course Social Innovation to our practice of trying to come up with a novel solution to a social problem. We come to understand better that in order to bring about positive changes to the social problem, we need to think bold, actively contact informants, and persistently pursue opportunities.