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Return on social investments

by Kate Lilienthal

Graduating Stanford student Topsy St. Matthew-Daniel is determined to reverse the brain drain that plagues the economy of her native Nigeria. She's returning home to launch a nonprofit recruiting service that matches Nigerians living overseas with quality jobs at home. Next stop: the rest of continental Africa.

Stanford senior Ben Sywvlka isn't waiting for graduation. He's assembled a small team of faculty, undergraduate and graduate students to build a wireless data service in Guatemala. Sywvlka believes that connecting people to relevant resources for learning, research, and commerce helps create economic opportunities. He intends to put a personal digital-assistant device in every rural village.

Back on the home front, Stanford junior Laura Feldman is working hard to help alleviate the Bay Area's affordable housing crisis. Her nonprofit organization, Bay Area Community Builders, has partnered with local city governments and housing organizations to place pre-fabricated cottages in the back yards of citizens with extra lot space. Homeowners receive the rental income; low-income tenants get an affordable home.

St. Matthew-Daniel, Sywvlka and Feldman were all finalists in the Social Entrepreneur's Challenge, run by Stanford's BASES (Business Association of Stanford Engineer Students).

BASES, one of the largest student-run entrepreneurship organizations in the country, holds a yearly business-plan competition called the Entrepreneur's Challenge (E-Challenge), with the idea of developing the next generation of entrepreneurs. This year, for the first time, the BASES executive team added a category for socially responsible business ideas.

"The E-Challenge offered me the support and guidance I needed to turn an academic idea into a viable business plan. As an undergraduate, it was an incredible opportunity," said Feldman.

As the Social E-Challenge kicked-off, students sprang forward with ideas for not-for-profits. To the surprise of organizers, faculty, and participants alike, the same number of socially responsible as for-profit plans was submitted for judging.

"We have incredible students at Stanford; many of whom strive for higher meaning in their lives. The Social E-Challenge unleashed an outpouring of interest," said Gordon Bloom, a Stanford lecturer in Public Policy Program in Humanities and Sciences.

To participate, teams must include one current Stanford student, doctoral staff or faculty member. Participants in the for-profit category are typically business and engineering students. Because the Social E-Challenge requires that initiatives have a social impact, however, it attracted a broader range of entrants from across campus, drawing particularly on the humanities and life sciences.

Judging criteria in both categories included innovativeness, feasibility, quality of the management team, and the clear viability of an income stream. But in the social entrepreneurship category, judges looked critically for one more attribute -- a social return on investment.

Of the 31 social entrepreneurship plans submitted, six emerged as finalists. Winners and finalists received a portion of an $8,000 prize pool towards the pursuit of their initiative.

This year's first-prize winner was Eclipse, a soccer sports clinic in Foster City that teaches disabled children to play and learn alongside "typical" kids. Already up and running but struggling, Eclipse used the Social E-Challenge to work through the rigors of a real business plan that would take them from philanthropic concept to robust nonprofit.

Eclipse won $5,000 in cash and in-kind services. Such services include one year of free legal assistance from the Menlo Park office of law firm Davis, Polk and Wardwell and a small amount of support from Wells Fargo Bank.

Says Eclipse team member Todd Singleton, "The financial support is important to us but the most invaluable reward is the many helpful relationships formed throughout the competition."

Feldman's Bay Area Community Builders won second place and $1,000. Each of the other four finalists received $500.

Participants developed their plans throughout the school year with the support of mentor relationships and workshops, presenting their plans to judging panels in May. It's the educational experience, not the competition, that organizers stress.

The competition was closely integrated with the social entrepreneurship curriculum in the Public Policy Department and the School of Engineering. Four of the six finalists developed their ideas and business plans as part of Bloom's three-course series on social entrepreneurship.

Bloom says that getting students to tackle social responsibility can be a tough sell. Economic opportunities that offer safety and power are relentlessly compelling. But he finds that for many, the search for higher meaning stirs grand ideas.

Adds Katherine Barr, BASES former vice president of marketing, "With the events of 9/11, students are more likely than ever to pause and reconsider the personal value in making a meaningful social contribution." For more information on BASES and the Social E-Challenge competition, visit the BASES E-Challenge Web site at http://bases.stanford.edu/challenge.html