Cowan GOOD to GREAT Programme

Prototyping an innovative new collaborative approach to CRIME PREVENTION

… via EDUCATION, ART andLOCAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Breaking with convention

• A depressed local economy with rampant unemployment is a breeding ground for crime and violence.

• New Brighton, where Cowan High School is situated, is one of three police precincts in the Eastern Cape (South Africa) that have seen sharp rises this year in crime, with car hijacking, house burglaries and business robberies showing the sharpest increases.

Reducing dependency

• Conventional Social Crime Prevention wisdom regards the alignment of the programmes of different government departments and civil society as a key contributor to improved community social cohesion.

• However conventional logic is flawed and seemingly ignores one VERY key issue … people cannot survive without a sustainable source of income. Social grants are not an answer … they increase rather than reduce dependency.

• The challenge which the Cowan GOOD to GREAT programme faces is reducing dependency by opening up opportunities for income generation and sustainable livelihoods ... for both graduating students and the community at large.

A New Paradigm

• We believe there is a need to look BEYOND ‘alignment’ and ‘integration’ and explore outside-the-box solutions;

• We need to shift from our traditional “Western” way of thinking to embrace a new paradigm;

• The traditional African ethos of UBUNTU, which is all about COLLABORATION for mutual benefit … provides a better answer.

The challenge …

The increasing crime and violence in New Brighton challenges us to address social fragmentation … by developing a cohesive community with a common vision of the future and a WORKABLE PLAN to achieve that vision.

Collaboration … differentiating the G2G Programme

• Well known examples of how collaboration has been applied on a massive scale include ‘Wikipedia’ and the ‘Linux’ computer operating system … open source initiatives that tap into the Power of the Crowd.

• What differentiates our approach is that we are proposing a system that enables people to profit from their involvement in an on-going and sustainable way. They are not simply helping someone else to solve a problem … they are materially benefitting THEMSELVES by provide answers.

The potential of CollaborationA ‘collaboration’ approach changes the power dynamics in the community … enabling the emergence of a new business model based on co-ownership rather than the traditional employer/employee model.• It recognises that each contributor offers something of unique value

(be it know-how, skills, contacts, money, or whatever) which can be channelled towards the ‘common good’ of participants;

• It realizes that “community” need not be restricted to the “terrestrial” level only … but benefits by removing geographic restrictions and operating in a ‘open’ manner.

• This capability to tap into the wisdom know-how and skills of our ‘own’ global team of experts offers us the potential to recruit whatever expertise and support is necessary. The Power of UBUNTU!

Social Networking

• Before the advent of social networking, assembling a collaborative team of this nature was virtually impossible.

• With the advent of Facebook and Twitter (in particular) we have unlocked infinite potential to build community-based business structures … providing we have a sufficiently cohesive social networking infrastructure to bring the players into direct communication with one another and manage this interaction.

• Through our ability to plan in a creative but systematic way, it is possible to trigger the development a cohesive, self-sustaining local community economy.

• Every school is a unique institution, drawing together a large and random crowd of people … and moulding them into a “community” based on their shared experience of school life;

• ‘Pride in one’s school’ invokes our first sense of ‘loyalty’ (beyond the immediate family) … it is the glue that binds a disparate set of individuals into a unique “community”;

• Eventually, former students will spread their wings and develop their own individual networks … but still remain forever anchored and emotionally attached to their school … the ‘safe space’ that shaped their formative years;

• School is a powerful emotional anchor for many of us … it is from these roots that a great tree will grow.

• The extended school community provides a huge resource pool of imagination, skills, know-how and experience … it is the school’s unique “Crowd” … a global network that, if we can effectively harness it, has the potential to provide answers to virtually any problem we’ll ever need to face.

Hypothesis: The school as the hub of a global community:

Cowan High School : Introducing our Pilot Programme

• The Cowan G2G Programme is an initiative conceived in collaboration with a great bunch of kids from Cowan High School in New Brighton.

• Cowan High School is an impoverished but inspirational township school in a struggling community ... located within line of sight of Port Elizabeth’s iconic 2010 World Cup soccer stadium.

• Cowan has a proud history … and instead of being satisfied with being ‘average’ the Cowan Community consciously decided to be the VERY BEST that they could be.

The success of The Cowan High School G2G concept depends on our ability to nurture and develop a local “community” with global outreach. We choose to anchor our community to a local school because we believe that a school has several unique attributes from a networking perspective:• Every school is the hub of its own unique community. • As we connect up the school’s community we initiate an ever-expanding social

network, whose ‘reach’ is global. • Using social networking principles, we can grow , inter-connect, structure and

manage ‘our’ school’s community.• By ensuring that goals are agreed, individual programmes and projects are

aligned … we’ll all work together to mutual advantage Think about it … the ‘old-boys club’ of upper-class ‘establishment’ schools shape the future success of everyone who passes through those hallowed portals. Although our motives are rather more altruistic, this is clearly a sound theory to build on. We simply speed up and formularise the process.

The school as a Open Collaborative Networking hub

Cowan’s Unique Strengths and Opportunities

• The school’s most obvious current ‘strength’ is in the performing arts, where they have a number highly talented vocal performers in the school’s sublime (and award-winning) choir;

• The school’s financially-challenged neighbourhood community offers a wealth of accessible skills and know-how (particularly in the area of manufacturing … thanks to industrial lay-offs and a weakening local economy) that can be translated into marketable products;

• The Cowan Kids through their rapidly developing social networking skills, hold the key to expanding the focus from the local to the global market.

Modelling our approach

Art and Culture

Entrepreneurship

Academic

The Cowan G2G Programme focuses attention on three separate areas: • Education; • Art; and • Entrepreneurship

Each is an independent open innovation project in its own right, but their objectives are closely aligned and designed to interact holistically to achieve the common vision and the broader aims and objectives of the programme.

In our model, Integration happens horizontally, vertically an laterally, and from a right-brain, left-brain and total-brain perspective … to encourage a cross pollination of ideas across different disciplines

Programme Aims

• Academically, we WILL transform Cowan into a great educational institution with results that rival and even surpass the finest “elite” schools in the area;

• Artistically, we WILL develop the latent talent present in the area and the surrounding community into a world-class incubator of original artistic thought and expression;

• Entrepreneurially, we WILL kick-start a new kind of vibrant and cohesive local community economy, with everyone supporting one another … in the TRUE spirit of UBUNTU.

Programme Objective 1: Academic

• To retrain every Cowan educator in modern interactive, experiential teaching methods to internationally recognised standards … thereby empowering them to practice their skills using available resources and within the budgetary constraints imposed on all public high schools.

• In recognition of the fact that 50% of matriculants will not find jobs in the formal sector by the age of 24, to prepare all Cowanites for a different future … via a rounded education that values thinking skills, artistic expression and entrepreneurial effectiveness.

• To adapt the curriculum to address not only academic effectiveness … but simultaneously to look at the practical needs of the students and how these can be aligned to the outcomes of the other legs of this programme.

Programme Objective 2: Art and Culture

• To identify talented members of the school’s “art community” in all disciplines and nurture, develop and hone their skills to the highest international standards:

• To provide a platform to expose these emerging talents to a global market … and help them to exploit opportunities to the benefit of the individual artists concerned;

• To simultaneously raise funds for various innovative collaborative initiatives linked to the Cowan G2G programme in the areas of Education, Art, Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

Programme Objective 3: Entrepreneurship

• To empower the Cohen Community to uplift the school and its neighbourhood by developing and activating the entrepreneurial skills and resources of its COMMUNITY, both local and global.

• To unveil and pilot a unique UBUNTU-inspired COLLABORATIVE entrepreneurship model that spurs REAL Local Economic Development at community level with the aim of transforming the local economy and making it self-sustainable and able to absorb much of its existing and emerging manpower.

• To position our projects to tap into a large existing reservoir of funding geared towards youth entrepreneurship and SMME development

• To offer financial benefits in proportion to each member’s inputs ... not as employees, but as shareholders in a series of innovative, sustainable and profitable new ventures.

Current Status of the Programme

• The G2G Programme has the keen support of the school’s ‘establishment’ including the principal, Trevor Dolley, the School Governing Body and the teaching staff;

• The G2G Programme has an active and enthusiastic presence on Facebook involving mostly present and past students; https://www.facebook.com/groups/119830591493230/?fref=ts

• Our global group of “Friends of Cowan” are actively involved with the planning and implementation of various projects;

Immediate Challenges to confront:

• With a strong core group in place, our first challenge is to persuade the broader Cowan Community of the concrete benefits of constructive participation in the programme, how it will benefit themselves personally … while transforming their old alma mater, Cowan High School … from GOOD to GREAT.

• Our second challenge is to enable effective collaboration … by Crowdfunding the development of the web-architecture to successfully connect the Cowan G2G core-group with our Community on various levels … from local to the school’s global diaspora, via Facebook and our own unique collaboration platform.

Funding the G2G programme

• With regard to the ‘Academic’ leg of the programme, we are seeking donor funding from an institutional source. To that end the proposal is with Shanduka’s “Adopt-a-School” Foundation.

• For the other two legs, the plan is to rapidly achieve self-sustainability status by self-funding via a combination of

(1) building on Cowan’s existing resources and skills, and (2) appealing to our Crowd.

• We plan to kick-start the process by seeking a seed-grant of €15,000 from a empathetic funding partner. A breakdown of the programmes requirements in this regard follows:

Seed-Funding Budget Summary1. Community support and buy-in

Support thus far has been stimulated via the Cowan G2G Facebook group. We plan to facilitate a series of meetings, workshops, focus groups discussions, etc. to extend buy-in to ALL key stakeholder groups.

€ 4,860.00

2. Crowdfunding Campaign

Beyond the initial seed-funding request, our focus will be on getting our Crowd to fund the various activities of the programme. We seek financial assistance to prepare and implement the campaign

€ 3,350.00

3. Administrative Support

Running costs , administration, travel, sustenance, stipends: Nov. and Dec. 2012

€ 6,780.00

TOTAL Requested €14,990.00

Core Management Team (1)

• Ian Bentley: Visionary Innovator and social-entrepreneur. Ubuntu Entrepreneurship originator. Strategic Planner and Concept originator. G2G group moderator on Facebook … Role: Programme Integrator and Co-ordinator. http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=32423647&trk=tab_pro

• Tony Pearce: Passionate UK-based educationalist and experiential teaching expert. Doctoral dissertation on education in New Brighton, Driving force behind “Red Location Choir”… Role: Project Co-ordinator: Academic Leg.

• Yvette Dubel: Celebrated American Artist and Innovator. Cultural Fusion and Community Change Management expert, Specialist in“Applied Art-based Solutions”. Founder – “Context Magazine” ... Role: Project co-ordinator: Art and Culture Leg. http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=4004093&locale=en_US&trk=tyah

Core Management Team (2)

• Tiberius Brastaviceanu: Based in Montreal, Canada. Global authority on collaborative business practice, p2p economy. Expert on value networks, open innovation. Community and ecosystem architect. Mentorship and support ... Role: Project Co-ordinator: Entrepreneurship. http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=12912528&locale=en_US&trk=tyah

• Deborah J Boyd: Based in Washington DC. Information technology expert. Education expert. Super-connector. Fund raising strategist. Organisation Architect … Role: Fundraising Co-ordinator. http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=12912528&locale=en_US&trk=tyah

Conclusion:• Currently South African education consists of students being force-fed a

series of facts and expected to memorise them. If successful this will get the student to university. If not he will be on the street searching for a job. Either way the future does not look rosy.

• Our approach is holistic. We will empower our children to be the very best that they can be, providing a rounded education, with problem-solving skills on a par with anywhere in the world!

• Students with artistic talents will be taught how to utilise them … likewise those who demonstrate entrepreneurial acumen. Project teams built around a combination of passion, skill and know-how will begin to change the way that business is done.

• Ultimately, we offer a solution that will turn around not only a school … but with it a community. A win/win solution where all who actively participate will share in the long-term benefits.

• It’s a DREAM whose time has come.