Marie’s Learning Journal

In the last 6 weeks of this class, I learned that being a social innovator is hard work! During these weeks, my group and I had to narrow our solution quite a bit in order for it to be viable and feasible in helping our social issue.  I learned that creating a solution and testing-it out in pilot findings can be very tricky and difficult because we have to look at all the aspects of our novel solution, for example, the opportunity our solution can create for those low income immigrant seniors, the people involved in the solution and those who are benefiting from it, other organizations that want to partner with us, where we will generate our funds from and finally, the social value our novel solution will create in society.  Why, this sounds similar to the Social Value Proposition Model.  As a matter of fact it is the social value proposition model!  Being involved in this whole invention and implementation process has helped me understand the this social value proposition model even more on a hands on basis.

During this process in inventing our innovative solution, this project has taught me that there has to be a lot of trial and error in order for solutions to be sustainable and feasible in the real world.  Furthermore, I learned alot about the different social issues in metro vancouver through the many interesting presentations we had in our class.

Overall, I really enjoyed this class and the projects were very intense, but at the same time very rewarding for our group to have accomplished such a big task.  Im very glad that I am working with such talented and creative people in my group who strive the greatest to achieve a goal.

SALIIAS Club Events for the Upcoming Semester

DETAILED LIST OF FUTURE EVENTS HOSTED BY SALIIAS

Icebreaker: Official first event hosted by our club

• Icebreaker BBQ for all SFU volunteers to enjoy delicious food  and meet everyone in the club
• The rules and objectives of the club is explained to the volunteers

Conference for seniors and volunteers – hosted in a community center in metro-vancouver

• Light refreshments will be provided by the club
• Give seniors a chance to meet the different groups of volunteers
• Gives the group a chance to find out what the seniors needs are

Charity Event – hosted by the club in SFU to collect funding for the club

• Stand at booth at school and maybe sell krispy donuts to raise funds for the club
• Also a chance to recruits more volunteers and raise awareness of our issue to SFU

Information sessions

• Informing immigrant seniors about the many services and programs out there for them
• Have a guest speaker explain the importance of tax returns, government sources of income, application deadlines
• Complimentary lunch will be provided

Cultural Day Festival at the Park

• A chance to celebrate the different ethnic cultures that immigrant seniors are accustomed to
• Have different activities outside that celebrate the different cultures of the immigrant seniors
• Variety of food from Korean, Chinese, Aboriginal will be available for all seniors to eat

Brain Fitness Games Day

• Cross train seniors’ brains with interactive games and activities
• Hear presentations on community centers that provide services to each ethnic senior community
• Have experts from clinics to inform immigrant seniors about maintaining a healthy lifestyle and a healthy brain

Recognition Awards Ceremony

• For those outstanding SFU volunteers to be recognized for their community work in assisting immigrant & aboriginal seniors

Below is a timeline for our future plans in hosting events for our club:

Learning Journal – Mani

In the last 6 weeks, I have learned that the innovation process is a multi-faceted one, and one that does not necessarily follow a linear structure; although it can in some cases. One important lesson I learned while developing our novel solution was that constantly challenging any proposed innovation is very important to do, as it narrows the scope of our solution to a social problem, which makes for a more focused approach.

An unforseen consequence of the many in-class activities, presentations, and blogs that we have created is that I have realized I have a true passion for blogging. Upon completion of this class, I will be setting up my own blog to promote the causes that I am interested in. Unfortuanetly, funding for your social innovation is quite possibly the biggest challenge you face in attempting to implement your innovation. This reality of life has taught me to think outside of the box, and make use of resources already available to implement the innovation. In the case of our innovation, we decided to make use of the large number of potential volunteers who will be given incentives for offering their services and time.

I have also learned that the social innovation process, much like any process that strives to change the status quo, requires adequete and stable sources of funding. Ultimately, I was well aware of the importance of inovation in business, but by no means did I realize the many different aspects that come into play when it comes time to implement ones social innovation.

Shabnam’s learning jourinal

Novel solutions don’t happen instantly. But the best thing about them is that once they are set in place and clearly defined, they can be passed on from one hand to another, from one generation to the next, and so on.

In the course of social innovation, I haven’t only learned about senior poverty in Metro Vancouver. I have also learned about energy sources, water crisis, food shortages, global inequality, over education, under education, diapers, … ; I’ve also learned about the lives of the homeless, about where my trash is sent off to, violence against sex trade workers, a land in Surrey referred to as Barnston Island,  and about the drug addicts in Vancouver’s downtown eastside.

And the best thing about what I’ve learned is that my friends in this class have all been able to tackle these social problems in a 3 – 13 week period.

Key People Involved

Here are the list of key people who have contributed to the creation of our blog. We would like to appreciate all of the supports and helpful advices in formulating our proposal for immigrant senior poverty.

1. President of Korean Senior Society: He helped our group understand the financial benefits and discounts programs currently available in Canada and the detailed explanation about the true situation of Korean immigrant seniors.

2. Penny Goldsmith: Based on her comments, our novel solution is very ambitious and would require active requirement from various cultural communities, and she further suggested us to contact MOSAIC and/or ISS and to conduct a student survey to discover whether many students would actually be willing to join in our club.

3.  Dr.Mark Selman: He advised us on the pressing and chronic issues of First Nations People such as inadequate quality of few number of housings, expensive local stores, limited health services in community, addiction problems, and family disruptions. 

4. Georontology Department:

a. EunJu Hwang, Adjunct Professor: She commented that our blog is very resourceful and liked our newly proposed solutions to work with vulnerable seniors. She was trying to be very helpful by asking us to forward our message to program coordinatiors at the organizations providing senior services such as SUCCESS, MOSAIC, and BC Housing)

5. Eric Lau, the coordinator of S.U.C.C.E.S.S.: In order for us to earn the insight from the experts, we asked for Eric’s expert idea and he said that he liked our new proposal of student club helping  out low income seniors as these projects would be the ”hands on projects that can easily demonstrate outcomes by the number of seniors (we) assisted.”  Furthermore, he added that we would find out more types of senior services as we interact with them in life.

6. SFU students responding to our survey: SFU students would play a pivotal role in improving the life of low income seniors in their communities; thus, it was vital for our group to survey their interest in joining the club. 

7. Korean people responding to our survey: Our group wanted to use the pilot study of at least one ethnic community to find out what drives younger Korean immigrants to volunteer in their communities so that based on the survey results, we would know the tactics as to how to motivate students in our club.

8. Senior Services Society: After seeing our blog, they referred us to important organization that would be useful for our research such as ISS (Immigrant Services Society) of British Columbia, the Chinese Cultural Society CCM, and the Centre of Integration for African Immigrants and so on.

9. Sue Noga, Community Developer, Metro Vancouver: She referred us to the Senior Services Society by offering us the insights for current pilot projects for housing where funds are raised and Seniors Society rent private apatments that would allow seniors short stay emergency housing accommodation.

Interview with President of Korean Senior’s Society

Long Journey of Korean Canadian Senior: Interview with the President of Korean Senior’s Society

On July 17, I was lucky to have an invaluable opportunity to discuss the vivid, detailed situations of senior Korean-Canadians for about an hour by visiting the Korean Seniors Society situated on the 1320 Hastings Street in East Vancouver. Surprisingly, this is the only place for Korean Seniors who can gather together and share interesting times with fellow Korean immigrant seniors across the whole cities in Metro-Vancouver. When I first arrived at the senior society, the architecture looked a bit old and gray and seemed to lack much sophistication. My first impression of this building of Korean Senior Society was naturally not very positive as the building looked a bit solitary and lonely. However, the comments and viewpoints of Korean President for the senior society on Canada’s welfare treatment towards senior immigrant Koreans were unexpectedly positive although there are still some issues that need to be resolved.

Sidney Chaye, the president of Korean Seniors Society in Vancouver, was gladly willing to offer his perspectives as the representative of Korean Seniors. In the interview, he said that he has lived in Canada for 41 years and remained in the Canadian workforce, which had allowed him to accumulate Canadian Pension Plan (CPP) funds since his arrival. In addition to the pension plan, he added that financial security for seniors who have at least lived for 10 years can be protected with additional financial supports such as the Old Age Security (OAS) and Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS). Despite his general satisfaction with Canada, I would still like to know whether there are some marginalized groups of Korean seniors who experience some extent of financial difficulties due to their lack of language skills or culture differences.

When I showed this particular interest in some of isolated and economically struggling, senior Koreans, he emphasized that most poor seniors are not able to come to Canada unless their adult children could specifically demonstrate the proof of stable income sources that will allow the children to afford to financially support their senior parents. In terms of the cultural and language problems, their adult children again play a major role in translating for their parents in the hospital, government, or anywhere. In other words, in Korean Culture, (I believe that this culture is also applicable to other Asian culture which is influenced by Confucianism), adult children, a son-in-law, or a daughter-in-law have a filial duty to take care of their parents and act mainly as the “economic sponsor” based on the statements of Chaye. He goes on to say that without the sponsorship of the senior immigrant, government usually does not accept them. That means that senior immigrants who do not possess sponsorships through the kin would be prohibited from pursuing immigrant process.

Based on his past experiences and observations, under the condition that normal immigrant remained actively in the workforce for 10 years and pay taxes during this period, immigrants are eligible for financial welfare even if if they end up in bankruptcy. In spite of this wide availability of welfare, some Korean immigrants are sometime not aware of their eligibility or fail to receive it simply because they did not apply for it due to the ignorance or the language barrier. If adult children could not aid their parents to properly prepare for the application, the president of Korean senior society, Chaye, said that he can usually help them out with the application processes and inform them about the eligibility criteria.

Interview with President of Korean Senior’s Society -continued

Long Journey of Korean Canadian Senior: Interview with the President of Korean Seniors Society- continued

During his discussion, he expressed mild concern that not many younger Korean volunteers existed to help the senior’s needs including the assistance with legal application processes and general social works for immigrant seniors. It reminded me of the research that emphasizes the weaknesses of the Canadian retirement income system that is not automatically granted to eligible seniors. He seemed to be genuinely disappointed at the service quality of multicultural society although they are government paid employees. Generally speaking, Chaye continued to comment that very few Korean social workers working toward the welfare of Korean seniors work with a clear sense of mission and enthusiasm for their work. For most of cases, many Korean seniors tend to be very disappointed about the poor service quality of multicultural society. That is why, he added, that many senior immigrants are reluctant to seek much help from fellow Korean social workers who are supposed to act in the best interests of clients, the senior Korean citizens, in this case. He was reluctant to discuss this issue in detail because this could hurt the image of social worker.

Chaye goes on to say that after meeting certain seven year residence requirements, financial supports from funeral expenses are usually available in addition to the senior housing that low income seniors should pay the 30% of their income. In terms of the transportation costs, seniors pay only $45 per one year for all zones in addition to the free ferry from Monday to Thursday. He was especially impressed with the qualities of health care system that even sends a social worker who would take care of caring seniors who cannot function well without helps of others. Under the Gold MSP card, many medical services are free or require seniors to pay the minimum. While he was very proud of this medical service in Canada, he laments the desperate situations of Korean seniors in Korea who are dying every day because they can’t afford the exorbitant medical costs.   

But the other concerns pertain to the lack of Korean Senior Housing that provides medical, caring, and private chores, etc. mainly in Korean. This is our minority status as Korean, whose population is approximately only 40,000 Korean. A lack of government funding that is specifically targeted for Korean is another issue. Although there are other senior housings such as Dutch housing or Jewish housing that do not limit the admission based on race, their foods provided by housing and the language they use make Korean seniors reluctant to go there. Hence, they usually live with adult children, but this may or may not be advantages for Korean seniors because they are usually treated as babysitter for their children’s babies.

After thanking him for agreeing to interview with me, he ends our interview with very witty comments: “Even if I have many biological children, Canada is my favorite, devoted son for me.” Smiling at his remarks, I was trying to discover some ways to improve the service qualities of multicultural societies and pondered why there are relatively few younger Korean volunteers available in Vancouver on my way to my house.     

From his remark, I thought that I could concentrate on this area of dissatisfaction with respect to the government-appointed employees who are genuinely interested in the well-being of our seniors for further explorations of novel solution.

 

Survey results from SFU students

To inspect the general attitudes of students towards establishing the SALIIAS club, 102 Students were surveyed from Business classes, Political Science class and the library, in order to understand their attitude towards the club in general and to forsee whether they would be interested in joining.

Sample of the Survey

SFU Student Association for Low Income Immigrant & Aboriginal Seniors
We are SFU business student currently taking BUS 493 (Social Innovation) class. In this class, we are to explore various social issues that we feel particularly passionate about and research the problems and causes of the issues. As a final step, we need to launch a novel solution that can address the social issues we have selected.
Our group, Christine, Mani, Shabnam, and Marie, is trying to tackle the social issues of low income immigrant seniors who have to face difficult times due to their limited financial means that are further aggravated by language and cultural barriers. To help alleviate the pains of this group of seniors, we are proposing to establish a student club consisting of various students of ethnic backgrounds who are able to speak the same language as the immigrant seniors they are assisting.
We are trying to find out whether you would feel interested in joining in this volunteer based student club in SFU in order to help out low income immigrant seniors in your ethnic communities.
The services you could offer vary depending on your academic faculty and skills. Some of the examples include the assistance with income tax return and help with application processes for government retirement income, computer class, and English class, etc.  You could also help with administration processes such as promotion, planning, organizing, etc.
If you are interested in knowing this project in more details, please visit this website:
http://seniorpovertyinmetrovancouver.wordpress.com/ 
1.     From the scale of 1 to 10, please indicate your interest of joining in this club by circling one of the numbers.
1           2         3         4         5         6          7          8          9             10
2.   What kind of skills do you feel you can offer to help out low income seniors in your ethnic communities?

Results of the First Question

The average rating on the first question pertaining to the scale of interest in joining the club was 5.4 with a rounded standard deviation of 3.0.

The graph below illustrates the number of students with respect to their ratings.

The result showed that Four students rated their interest as 10, meaning that they were 100% interested in the idea of the club.

One student was requesting to be notified by email about the club and the hours of needed commitment. Aswell some students  with lower scores had  indicated that they would like to join the club but were faced with barriers such as time restriction or graduating. 

 

 

 

 

Results of the Second Question

Students indicated that the they could bring a variety of skills to the club. Many, approximately 30 students, chose languages and translation. Specifically they inclined to be able to help with tasks such as helping seniors fill out tax forms and teaching them English.  Some respondents indicated being fluent in languages such as Cantonese and Mandarin, and were able to assist in helping seniors that faced cultural barriers in their ethnic communities. Approximately 15 students were interested in providing technological services, such as teaching how to navigate websites, and finding electronic information for seniors. Finally, students believed that they could help low income seniors by providing care and companionships.

Limitations

This survey was limited to two questions only in order to achieve a high scale of response rate and provide convenience for the respondents in terms of preserving their time in answering the surveys. If there were more questions that would have delved into the students’ psychographics or demographics, for example, a more meaningful result may have been derived from the survey.

Secondly, the survey was given to students only and it did not draw on the opinion of faculties or non-students. Although this was because  students were our target market for volunteers, we could have gained more insight by collecting surveys from other age groups as well to determine whether the idea sparked interest for any other age groups.

Additionally, those students who were given the surveys in the classroom or at the library did not have a chance to visit the blog for more information. Although the idea of the blog was generally described in the paragraph at the top of the survey, more knowledge of the issue would have been helpful for better results.

All in all, the survey provided us with a general understanding of student attitudes towards the club, and its feasibility of implementation in the future.

Learning Journal – Christine

Christine’s Learning Journal

July 24, 2009. 

Over the last 6 weeks, I have learned how challenging it is to work towards the alleviation of chronic social problems. Initially, I was very motivated to research and study the implications of poverty issues among immigrant seniors. However, as time goes by quickly, I realized that the initial passion that I had had in the beginning is no longer there when I encountered many difficulties associated with our novel solution. We have to change our novel solution dramatically as many people showed skepticism towards our initial novel solution.

 Sometimes, I simply had to accept that what I have researched for a certain period of time was not very useful or relevant to our novel solution at all.  Whenever, I needed to throw out my research findings, I felt like that I had wasted my time and energy. Furthermore, under the tight time schedule, I occasionally felt great pressure to finish my work quickly.    

 That is how I realized that social workers or people who are trying to change the world can be very frustrated and discouraged when they need to face the reality where their final solutions simply turn out to be unsuccessful or not viable in the end. I learned that in order to bring about the desirable social change, one should not be too naïve or overly idealistic. Possessing great degree of passion is certainly a desirable characteristic for social innovators; however, without rational and realistic diagnosis of social problems, any good idea could be simply abandoned in the end. That is, even if our idea sounds to be excellent in theory, it can be totally unrealistic in practice.

 I remember that one of our guest speakers told us that we wanted to change the world over such a short period of time. I did realize how naïve I was when approaching many social problems, believing as if I could change the world in such a short period of time. These social issues were chronic matters that cannot be eliminated over one night. I come to realize the fact that how I was too emotional and uncritical. I did lack realistic expectations and diagnosis in terms of tackling the social problems.

 Initially, I took this course because I thought that I would be able to apply the knowledge and skills learned from this class for my volunteer role. Indeed, I feel that I am very fortunate to have this invaluable opportunity to be exposed to a wide variety of social issues that I was not aware of before.

As I begin to listen to more voices from people who are truly angry or frustrated by social injustice from all over the world, I learned a valuable lesson. The world is indeed crying out to acquire a higher degree of justice, fairness, and compassion. I believe that after taking this class, I would be able to take more time to listen to the desperate cries from the marginalized, isolated, and abandoned people on their side.

Survey from Korean Community

Survey from Korean Community : Motivations to Volunteer

- This survey is conducted to explore the main reasons that motivate young Koreans to volunteer. Korean community is selected as one example of many ethnic communities. -  

: Our group has conducted a survey by approaching one hundred younger Korean people at HanARum supermarket    located in Coquitlam. HanARum supermarket is a very popular place where the majority of Koreans go for grocery shopping. The survey is conducted on July 19, Sunday as a lot of Koreans tend to visit supermarket for the weekend special.

Questions for the survey include nine reasons that illustrate why young Koreans want to volunteer. From the scale of 1 to 10, Koreans are asked to circle the answer that best describes their real reasons to volunteer. 

Below is the visual illustration of  what motivates young koreans (from grade 10 to age 35) to volunteer and the detailed description of reasons.

 1. First Reason: I could meet various types of interesting people by volunteering and would grow to be a mature and responsible adult.  (747 points)

2. Second Reason: I would be able to become less ego-centric and could help my neighbor in need. It also gives me pure joy from doing good deeds. (739)

3. Third Reason: I can gain valuable experiences that I cannot easily acquire and also develop leadership skills and interpersonal skills as a person who have the capacity for tolerance. (731)

4. Fourth Reason: By participating in the volunteering work, I feel that it is very worthwhile to spend my time and energy.   (716)

5. Fifth Reason: I would like to involve in Canadian society and contribute to the society in which I live. (699)

6. Sixth Reason: I could gain knowledge, experience, and practical skills and know-how by volunteering. (683)

7. Seventh Reason: Somebody helped me out in the past when I need help from others. So I would like to give it back and offer some help. (625)

8. Eighth Reason: Due to my limited work experience, I want to gain practical experiences that would build up my resume. (527)

9. Ninth Reason: It is required by school. (404)

 

Only 17% of total respondants said that they would volunteer because it is either required by a school or it would look good ontheir resume; whereas, 47% of respondents indicated that they would do it for the altruistic reasons.  (The second, fourth, fifth, and seventh reasons). 36.81% of respondents stated that they would volunteer since they can acquire soft skills such as interpersonal or leadership skills. Also, they said that meeting interesting people and acquiring knowledge and practical skills via volunteer work is one of the powerful motivator they want to further develop. Therefore, we could probably conclude that young generation may want to volunteer not because of the benefits on their resume alone, but because of the altruistic reasons that truly make students feel that they need to be committed to a good cause.  Nonetheless, we need to exercise careful judgement in terms of our interpretation as this is only a result of one ethinic community (Korean community). In addition to the one survey for Korean ethnic community, our group has also conducted an overall survey that include more diverse ethnic groups such as Chinese, Korean, African, Indian, European, etc.