Donnelly School of Leadership and Social Innovation

Solve the Big Problems

Why does the world need a new kind of leader prepared to inspire and deliver a different kind of value? Because solving the world’s most urgent problems — whether at the neighborhood or global scale — depends upon the collective impact of many people and organizations.

The Donnelly School for Leadership and Social Innovation is uniquely positioned to help good people create organizational, community and universal good. We draw upon Boler College centers of excellence and faculty expertise in responsible leadership, ethics, entrepreneurship and social innovation.

With an emphasis on entrepreneurial responses and neighborhood-level engagement and investment, Donnelly School for Leadership and Social Innovation graduates stand alongside our partner businesses and communities engage eager to shape the future.

Note: A 2019 gift from Sue and Bill Donnelly (1984 and 1983 Marketing and Accountancy graduates of �Ӱ��̳) established the Donnelly School of Leadership and Social Innovation.

A New Kind of Leader

Society’s toughest problems require leaders who can focus and inspire a diverse group of stakeholders to identify and deliver shared solutions. Such an approach is called collective or systems leadership. At the Donnelly School of Leadership and Social Innovation, we attract undergraduate and graduate students seeking purpose and meaning at the intersection of work and values. Donnelly faculty and students approach problem solving with a sense of purpose – a desire to improve everything from neighborhood safety in a local community to the environmental conditions for people halfway around the world.

Innovative Solutions to Complex Problems

In the past, advocates of innovation and value argued for a simplistic view of the role of corporations, government and powerful non-profits in our society. The Donnelly School of Leadership and Social Innovation joins many others reconsidering such long-held assumptions. We look for dialogue and opportunities to co-create value at the intersection of markets, businesses, governments, and society to promote more accountable capitalism and a more just and sustainable world. Rather than seeing this diverse involvement and wider perspective as an impediment, we see the public and social sectors — true social innovation — as the best way to confront challenging and often systemic issues in support of both business success and social progress.

Donnelly School of Leadership and Social Innovation

Solve Complex Problems

Make data-driven decisions that utilize creative and critical thinking, and identify and develop new social innovation opportunities.

Impact the World

Make holistic judgments when analyzing business situations and social problems, using a strategic understanding of leadership and innovation and consider the relationships between various disciplines.

Practice Ethical Reasoning & Empathy

Demonstrate ethical reasoning skills; understand social, civic, and professional responsibilities; aspire to add value to society.

Work in the Community

Donnelly faculty and students approach problem solving with a sense of purpose – a desire to improve everything from neighborhood safety in a local community to the environmental conditions for people halfway around the world.

Social Enterprise and Change

In 2020, students from the Muldoon Center for Entrepreneurship at �Ӱ��̳ worked with their neighbors from the Ward 6 neighborhood to do a walkability assessment designed to identify neighborhood service needs, and guide future community investment. Art x Love, LLC, a creative agency based in Akron (OH), showed student/resident teams how to collect data and produce a geographic information system (GIS) map of walkability issues and opportunities. Funded by a $50,000 Verizon Foundation grant, begins �Ӱ��̳’s long-term partnership in the Ward 6 area on the east side of Cleveland, as part of the .

Food for Thought

As experiential learning projects go, this one is straightforward. Operate a mobile food buggy to turn a profit, and then use that profit to feed people experiencing homelessness. Along the way, �Ӱ��̳ students learn to develop, implement, and refine a social venture business model. As each successive group of students participates in this project and improves upon the work of the previous group, they will learn to:

Navigate successes and failures, draw on the strengths and talents of each other, stay creative and nimble, apply what they know and learn what they don’t know, remain open to change, adaptation, and mid-course correction.

Social Innovation Fellows

Social Innovation Fellows are dedicated to creating social innovators and entrepreneurs who are inspired by Ignatian values — rigor, generosity, gratitude, inclusivity, solidarity, and a desire for the greater good.

We challenge them to grow your entrepreneurial mindset, your curiosity, and your desire to experiment while you actively engage with the Ward 6 community in Cleveland to understand what is holding residents back from thriving and to collaboratively build sustainable solutions that will empower and transform their future. You’ll become a catalyst for social innovation and entrepreneurship across the �Ӱ��̳ campus and in any community in which you find yourself.

Learn More