Free Consulting Service for Your Non-Profit from George Mason University

2013 Social Innovation Program: Community Partnerships

Are you a Northern Virginia nonprofit organization or social enterprise looking for assistance in strengthening and growing your organization? Apply to partner with a student consulting team from the Social Innovation Program (SIP) at George Mason University this summer.

What is SIP? SIP is an intensive five-week bootcamp that prepares college students to be our next generation of social entrepreneurs. Through a combination of classroom instruction and hands-on practice, participants learn how to effectively apply entrepreneurial approaches to social causes in the nonprofit, public, and private sectors. For the hands-on component, SIP students work in teams to address real needs of local community organizations. SIP student teams work under the guidance of our SIP Clinical Faculty, who are experienced nonprofit consultants and social entrepreneurs.

What Can a SIP Team Do for You? In past years, SIP student teams have helped community partners by: creating new business plans, conducting needs assessments, evaluating business development opportunities, designing key marketing paraphernalia and forging new university and community partnerships. All projects are done pro bono.

What Do We Ask of Community Partners? All community partners must agree to work with our SIP Teams from the week of June 24th until the end of the program end on or before July 19th, 2013. Community partners should assign a point of contact for our SIP Team as well as agree to meet with our teams three times over the five weeks.

Timing of 2013 SIP Projects: Projects will begin the week of June 24th and end on or before July 19th, 2013.

How to Apply: Community Project request forms should be electronically submitted no later than Wednesday, May 29, 2013.Upon submission of the form, please allow our team time to review your submission. We will be notifying organizations no later than Friday, June 7, 2013. Thank you for all you do for your community.