Innovation Unit

Last updated
Innovation Unit
Company typeNot-for-profit social enterprise
The Innovation Unit Ltd
IndustrySocial Innovation
Headquarters,
Key people
Paul Roberts (Chair), Sarah Gillinson (CEO)
Number of employees
Approx 30 (excluding associates) [1]
Website www.innovationunit.org

Innovation Unit is a not-for-profit social enterprise with a mission to grow and scale the boldest and best innovations that deliver long-term impact for people, address persistent inequalities, and transform the systems that surround them.

Contents

Their innovation and impact formula combines decades of practical experience with recent research, to help design new solutions, implement them successfully and take them to scale for greater impact. [2]

History

Innovation Unit was established in 2002 at the Department for Education and Skills, now the DfE, as part of the measures in the White Paper, ‘Schools - Achieving Success’. [3] Between 2002 and 2006, the remit was focused on education and children’s work. Early work focused on responding to innovative ideas that were sent into the Government, mainly by teachers and head teachers. Innovation Unit funded a number of these and provided advice and practical support for many others. Alongside other innovative small-scale projects, it worked on several large-scale programmes, such as the Leading Edge Partnership programme and Teachers TV.

Between 2003 and 2008, Innovation Unit advised on The Power to Innovate, a piece of legislation which enabled schools and Local Authorities to apply to the Secretary of State to have regulations lifted if a strong case could be made that they were getting in the way of raising standards in education. [4] Since 2006 Innovation Unit has been independent of government and receives no grant funding.

Operations

Innovation Unit works independently across the UK, Australia and New Zealand. The organisation is project-based, with clients ranging from local authorities and government departments, to charities and foundations. The Innovation Unit team, made up of innovation experts, researchers and designers, currently works to challenge and change systems for children and families, mental health, health and care, justice and violence and education. [5] [6]

Innovation Unit also offers an accredited Service Design course for professionals, through their Design Academy. The design academy focuses on building expertise in service and system design methodology, as applied to complex social issues. [7]

Publications

Visit https://www.innovationunit.org to view publications and blogs across the children and families, education, health inequalities, justice and violence reduction sectors.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Education</span> Transmission of knowledge and skills

Education is the transmission of knowledge, skills, and character traits and comes in many forms. Formal education happens in a complex institutional framework, like public schools. Non-formal education is also structured but takes place outside the formal schooling system, while informal education is unstructured learning through daily experiences. Formal and non-formal education are divided into levels that include early childhood education, primary education, secondary education, and tertiary education. Other classifications focus on the teaching method, like teacher-centered and student-centered education, and on the subject, like science education, language education, and physical education. The term "education" can also refer to the mental states and qualities of educated people and the academic field studying educational phenomena.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Physical education</span> Educational course related to the physique and care of the body

Physical education, often abbreviated to Phys. Ed. or PE, is a subject taught in schools around the world. PE is taught during primary and secondary education and encourages psychomotor, cognitive, and affective learning through physical activity and movement exploration to promote health and physical fitness. When taught correctly and in a positive manner, children and teens can receive a storm of health benefits. These include reduced metabolic disease risk, improved cardiorespiratory fitness, and better mental health. In addition, PE classes can produce positive effects on students' behavior and academic performance. Research has shown that there is a positive correlation between brain development and exercising. Researchers in 2007 found a profound gain in English Arts standardized test scores among students who had 56 hours of physical education in a year, compared to those who had 28 hours of physical education a year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nesta (charity)</span> British nonprofit innovation promotion organization

Nesta is a British foundation, registered as a charity, which supports innovation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Education in El Salvador</span> Overview of education in El Salvador

Education in El Salvador is regulated by the country's Ministry of Education. El Salvador consists of the following levels of education:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics</span> Group of academic disciplines

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is an umbrella term used to group together the distinct but related technical disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The term is typically used in the context of education policy or curriculum choices in schools. It has implications for workforce development, national security concerns, and immigration policy, with regard to admitting foreign students and tech workers.

Entrepreneurship education seeks to provide students with the knowledge, skills and motivation to encourage entrepreneurial success in a variety of settings.

Eklavya is an Indian NGO based in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh working in the field of education. It was registered as an all India in 1982. The organization is named after Eklavya, the protagonist of a story in the Mahabharat, for his determination to learn even in the absence of a teacher.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sutton Trust</span>

The Sutton Trust is an educational charity in the United Kingdom which aims to improve social mobility and address educational disadvantage. The charity was set up by educational philanthropist, Sir Peter Lampl in 1997.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Education in the Dominican Republic</span>

In the Dominican Republic, education is free and compulsory at the elementary level, and free but non-mandatory at the secondary level. It is divided into four stages:

Educational inequality is the unequal distribution of academic resources, including but not limited to school funding, qualified and experienced teachers, books, and technologies, to socially excluded communities. These communities tend to be historically disadvantaged and oppressed. Individuals belonging to these marginalized groups are often denied access to schools with adequate resources. Inequality leads to major differences in the educational success or efficiency of these individuals and ultimately suppresses social and economic mobility. Inequality in education is broken down into different types: regional inequality, inequality by sex, inequality by social stratification, inequality by parental income, inequality by parent occupation, and many more.

E-scape was a project run by the Technology Education Research Unit (TERU) at Goldsmiths University of London, England that developed an approach to the authentic assessment of creativity and collaboration based on open-ended but structured activities. As such it is an alternative to traditional assessment methodologies.

Catch22 is a social business, a not for profit business with a social mission which operates in the United Kingdom. Catch22 can trace its roots back 229 years, to the formation of The Philanthropic Society in 1788. Catch22 designs and delivers services that build resilience and aspiration in people and communities.

TARKI Social Research Institute is an independent research centre located in Budapest, Hungary. TARKI conducts applied socioeconomic research in social stratification, labour markets, income distribution, intergenerational transfers, tax-benefit systems, consumption and lifestyle patterns and attitudes in Hungary and, in the majority of its projects, in Europe. TARKI is closely embedded in international collaborations with major European academic partners in various research projects. Senior staff at TARKI all have PhDs with substantive and methodological interests and many hold professorial appointments at major universities. TARKI has its own fieldwork apparatus, capable of carrying out regular empirical surveys on social structure and on attitudes and of managing large scale international research. TARKI also carries out the Hungarian fieldwork of various high-quality international surveys.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan</span> Indian education programme for universal elementary schooling

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, or SSA, is an Indian Government programme aimed at the universalisation of Elementary education "in a time bound manner", the 86th Amendment to the Constitution of India making free and compulsory education to children between the ages of 6 and 14 a fundamental right. The programme was pioneered by former Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. It aims to educate all children between the ages of 6 and 14 by 2010. However, the time limit has been pushed forward indefinitely.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bridge International Academies</span> For-profit education company

Bridge International Academies is a company which provides for-profit education to children in India, Kenya, Nigeria and Uganda. It was started in 2008, and calls itself a "social enterprise". By 2022, Bridge had around 750,000 students in its schools. As of March 2023, it is the world's largest for-profit primary education chain. Its parent company is NewGlobe Schools, Inc.

PHASE is a partnership between several international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) registered in Austria, Nepal, the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States of America (USA). The organisations specialise in improving health and education services and livelihood opportunities for disadvantaged populations and most of this work takes place in Nepal. The acronym, PHASE, stands for "Practical Help Achieving Self Empowerment" and describes the working ethic of the organisations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aahung</span>

Aahung is a non-governmental organisation which aims to improve sexual and reproductive health. It is based in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan. It was established in 1994, and in 2013 was awarded the annual Human Rights Tulip prize by the Dutch government.

School violence prevention through education is the attempt to reduce violence and bullying through comprehensive approaches and interventions within the education sector. It aims to create a safe and non-violent learning environment. Acceptable practices include strong leadership; a safe and inclusive school environment; developing knowledge, attitudes, and skills; effective partnerships; implementing mechanisms for reporting and providing appropriate support and services, and collecting and using evidence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sustainable Development Goal 4</span> 4th of 17 Sustainable Development Goals to achieve quality education for all

Sustainable Development Goal 4 is about quality education and is among the 17 Sustainable Development Goals established by the United Nations in September 2015. The full title of SDG 4 is "Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on education in the United States</span>

In 2020, school systems in the United States began to close down in March because of the spread of COVID-19. This was a historic event in the history of the United States schooling system because it forced schools to shut-down. At the very peak of school closures, COVID-19 affected 55.1 million students in 124,000 public and private U.S. schools. The effects of widespread school shut-downs were felt nationwide, and aggravated several social inequalities in gender, technology, educational achievement, and mental health.

References

  1. "Our people" . Retrieved 2 March 2013.
  2. "About Innovation Unit". Innovation Unit. Retrieved 2024-02-01.
  3. Schools Achieving Success, Department for Education and Skills, 2001 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/355105/Schools_Achieving_Success.pdf
  4. "Power to Innovate - Schools". web.archive.org. 2012-04-06. Retrieved 2024-02-01.
  5. "Thoughts". Innovation Unit. Retrieved 2024-02-01.
  6. "About Innovation Unit". Innovation Unit. Retrieved 2024-02-01.
  7. "Home". Innovation Unit Design Academy. Retrieved 2024-02-01.