Recent Social Innovation Leadership Forum April 5th, 2013

The Silicon Valley
2nd Annual Social Innovation Leadership Forum 2013 (SILF 2013)
Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
 Isaac Newton Senter Auditorium and Board Chambers
Santa Clara County Office
70 West Hedding St., San Jose, CA 95110

In Spring 2012, San Jose State University hosted a highly successful Social Innovation Leadership Forum with its partners: Altis Solutions, The City of San Jose, Global Green Village, Hewlett-Packard, Social Enterprise Alliance – San Francisco Chapter, and Step-Up Silicon Valley. The Forum brought together over 120 nonprofit, corporate, community, education, entrepreneur and student leaders to explore how innovation and an innovation-centered leadership approach can help these leaders tackle society's most pressing challenges. As a result of this forum, partnerships between participants were created, and collaborative projects geared towards alleviating poverty in under-served neighborhoods were begun.

The 2013 conference, attended by 250 innovators and leaders from various sectors, continued the conversation from last year and helped the innovators of Silicon Valley come closer to achieving one common goal: providing social change in San Jose and giving relief to the social problems in our community.

This Forum embraced the "Unconference" theme, or Open Space Technology, in which participants are engaged in selecting topics of interest. 

 Social Innovation Leadership Forum 2012
On March 20, 2012 we co-sponsored an all-day Social Innovation Leadership Forum at the Mexican Heritage Plaza in San Jose. The purpose of this event was to bring together social entrepreneurs, thinkers and leaders from non-profits, business, government and the community to share innovation leadership lessons and help create a social innovation network.

There is a growing need for innovators to address the many social problems and economic challenges in our own backyard. 
Please visit the SI Leadership Forum 2012 home page to learn more about this event.

Social Innovation Institute (SI2)

This initiative leverages the symbiotic relationship among San José State University, social entrepreneurs, the city of San José, foundations, and other innovation organizations to encourage and train people to apply technology and innovation for the good of the local community. The Social Innovation team members are Bradley Maihack ( Hewlett-Packard), Richard Okumoto (Social Entrepreneur), Joyce Osland (Professor-SJSU), Malu Roldan (Professor-SJSU), Richard Sessions ( Altis Solutions) and Dave Wilde (Global Leader-In-Residence).

SHiFT Magazine

SHiFT is a unique, student-run magazine focused on innovation for the common good. Its goal as a catalyst for social change in the Silicon Valley goes beyond merely reporting facts to spurring its readers to action. SHiFT is published four times a year by students from San José State University. These highly talented students are advised by industry veterans: Richard Okumoto - publisher-magazine, Thomas Ulrich - editor-in-chief and journalism professor, Richard Sessions - publisher-web. The Social Innovation Institute team are board members.

Social Innovation at the Silicon Valley Innovation Challenge

All SJSU students and alumni can submit their social innovation ideas in the Silicon Valley Center for Entrepreneurship's annual Silicon Valley Innovation Challenge, held late Fall. There is a special award given to the best social innovation submission.