Social Innovation and Its Impact on Society

The concept of the social innovation generates from the interest of meeting the social needs that is generated from the community development, health or education. The social innovations are generally the new ideas, concepts and strategies that are for the betterment of the society (Cajaiba-Santana 2014).According to Moulaert (2016), the general objective of the social innovation is to unite the society and increase the strength of the society. The objective of the paper is to focus on the shape of the innovation and how the innovation will influence the society with precise focus on the organization Pure learning. The purpose of the paper is to evaluate the impact of the social innovation on the growth of the community and the engagement of the community. The paper will also discuss about a proposed example of the social innovation and the impact of the example in the society. Along with that the paper will also analyse the example by the analytical tools like SWOT and PESEL and will discuss the challenges in the implementation as well.

As mentioned above the social innovation will generally focus on contributing the society. According to the study of Moulaert, MacCallum and Hillier (2013), the impact of the social innovation will be highly influential for the society as the contribution that the new idea or the strategy is making, will be immense for the people of the society. Manzini (2014) claimed that the general social innovations will have a structure of deploying unique solutions to the emerging social and environmental issues of the current generation and in doing so it will develop the society in a unique way. It is also believed that the social innovation focuses the attention on the strategies or the ideas that are observed to produce the social values (Osburg 2013). Along with the concept of social innovation, the drivers for the social innovation can also be described as exchanging the ideas and the values, the shifting in the roles and relationship and the integration of the private capital with the public and philanthropic backing. The social innovation has a unique way to integrate people and that is significantly visible with the formation of the community and the engagement between the people inside the community groups. The success in engaging the people inside the community completely depends on the idea or the strategy that composes the innovation (Maclean, Harvey and Gordon 2013). Usually it is seen that the benefits of a particular social innovation concept is instrumental in engaging the people and along with that the impact of a particular social innovation is observed to influence the people in a great deal. This helps in increasing the social cohesion between the residents of that region in a significant manner which is necessary for the society in order to fight against the evil parts. The formation of the community from the social innovation helps in collaboration and co-production with the various other factors of the society (Voorberg, Bekkers and Tummers 2015).

Proposed Model of Social Innovation:

Proposed Model: Mobile Learning Applications for Pure Learning

The proposed model of the social innovation will be the formation of the mobile learning applications for increasing the literacy rates. The mobile being an electronic gadget is significantly influential for the kids of this generation (Berge and Muilenburg 2013). Several surveys are able to portray the statistics that the school students or the children of this generation are taking the classroom lectures in a not so convenient way. Whereas the students are observed to get significantly influenced to the lectures presented in the digital form specifically in the form of mobile applications. The increased range of graphics and the animations presented in the lectures of the mobile applications are observed to attract the attention of the students in a significant manner. Over the years the familiarization of the students with the mobile device created a certain space of attachment between the two and the not so interesting educational lectures had the limitations to reach the student in the traditional method (Chen and Denoyelles 2013). This was a significant opportunity for technology industry in order to create a solution which will have notable impact on the students. As the concerned rates of literacy is a major concern for the governments along with the lack of interest of the students on the traditional conceptual reading from the books, the introduction of the learning applications was just a matter of time.

But in the context of the above mentioned organization, the introduction of the mobile learning application will be significant as the organization did not take part in any sort of formation of the mobile application for the conduction of their teaching procedure. The organization controls their teaching procedure by means of their website. Now in case of the mobile application, the students will find it easy to gather all sort of educational videos from a single portal without too much internet browsing. Apart from this one of the major detrimental factors in smooth learning is the presence of external interruptions and in the browsing of the website of the mentioned organization, students may get deflected to some other website which may or may not be appropriate for them. The formation of the application becomes necessary in order to eliminate these threats as the sole objective of the organization is to increase the knowledge of the students.        

According to Vázquez-Cano (2014), the general advantages of using the learning mobile applications will be significant as it will reduce the barriers of fixed timing for taking the educational lessons as the online video classes will be present for the students to access any time. The high standard graphics and the three dimensional concepts of different mathematical expressions and elements make it incredibly easy for the students to get the lessons. Several surveys have confirmed that the students will be significantly attracted to the lessons with the higher degree graphical interpretations. This will also increase their ability to gather information from various sources regarding a particular topic. The concerned method of learning will enable the students to have a significantly high reduction in the communication gap between them and the teachers and that will be crucial as the confusion regarding a topic that a particular student never came across will be there at times. The online availability will help the students to get updated about the current information as it had been seen that the conventional books tend to belong to some previous years and the information in them may or may not be the current information (Mehdipour and Zerehkafi 2013). Hence the students can be deprived of the actual and present-day information in the traditional learning methods which can be countered with the online medium as the lectures will be real time.

Advantages of Mobile Learning Applications

The appropriateness of the mentioned social innovation example can be assessed better with the SWOT analysis.

Strength:

As mentioned earlier the mobility of the learning applications will be a significant boost in the application. Along with it, the 24/7 accessibility of the mobile applications will helpful as well for the students in order to overcome the issues of the fixed time for taking the educational lessons (Mehdipour and Zerehkafi 2013). It also helps to achieve a better and faster communication between the students and the teachers.

Weakness:

The major drawback in this case will be the absence of the digital literacy as the medium of communication along with the educational classes will be following a digital mode where the students will have to operate their mobile phones in order to take the learning lessons (Pereira and Rodrigues 2013). Hence the ability of the students in order to handle the digital mediums will be significant in this case. In spite of having the scope of a superior communication between the student and the teacher, the mechanism will have limited monitoring of the teachers on the students.

Opportunities:

The major point of opportunity for the mentioned example will be availability of the different online sources as study materials like e-books. Along with this the method will have the additional advantage of having an improved way of communication which may alter time to time according to the need of the interaction. The improved graphics for the online video classes of the learning apps will have the advantage of reducing the apathy of the students in taking the traditional classes and the study materials (Khaddage and Lattenman 2013). This will also enable them to understand the topic in a better manner.

Threats:

The privatization of the learning apps will be significant threat for the students as the increased amount of charges related to the products may reduce the number of students availing the products. The addiction towards the technology or rather the mobile phones will significantly increase with the introduction of the learning apps which according to many may cause significant damage to the childhood of the students. Along with that the student may get exposed to the harmful parts of the social media as well.

The PESTEL analysis will give a detailed explanation on the applicability of the mentioned social innovation example.

Political/Legal:

The country Australia is not observed to have much rules and regulations in the usage of mobile phones and the role of the political leaders in availing the digital medium is significant as well. The political leaders are not observed to impose any sort of major barriers to the mobile phone industry of the concerned nation rather even the politicians choose the digital medium more often than not for conveying their message to the followers. There is strict rule for the misuse of the mobile applications in the form of Crimes Legislation Amendment Act (2004) which covers the telecommunication offences (Legislation.act.gov.au, 2018).

Economic:

The experienced Australian politician Tanya Plibersek in one of her comment described that the Australian school funding is below than the international average by the data that shows Australia’s per student spending in the form of the percentage of the per capita GDP is 18% in the year 2016 for the primary in comparison to the OECD average of 22% and the same in the secondary is having a percentage of 23 compared to the OECD average of 25% (Finance.gov.au, 2018). This clarifies the gap in the government budget for nation in availing the technological advancement in the field of education but the Australian economy ensures that the nation will be investing significantly in the education. Hence the Mentioned social innovation will have a good future in the nation.

Analyzing the Proposed Model

Social: 

The Australian society is significantly tech-savvy and the people of the nation depends on the presence of the technology in an increased manner in order to communicate and operate their usual daily proceedings (Acma.gov.au, 2018). Hence the digital literacy will not be a significant issue for the people of the nation in order to cope with the digital interface in availing the educational lessons from the learning apps.

Technological:

The mentioned social innovation concept significantly depends on the technology as the mode of the classes and the learning lessons will follow the digital medium. The technological advancement in improving the graphics and the quality of the videos will significantly help the concept in order to influence a larger number of students.

Environmental:

   The concept is significantly eco-friendly. The traditional method of taking educational lessons usually incorporates the pen and paper method which is significantly harmful as the formation of the paper would observe larger number of tree cuts but in case of the lessons from the learning apps, the need of the papers in the process will not be significant.

The mentioned social innovation concept is instrumental in making sure that the apathy of the students in taking the traditional method of learning does not influence them much and the new concept with the improved attributes like the HD picture clarity along with improved animation and graphics will increase the amount of interest of the students for the educational lessons.

Challenges:

Though the availability of the mobile phones or computers in the mentioned country is significant but even in that case the people generally considers the traditional method to be more fruitful in order to achieve the education. The trust of the parents in the contents of the learning apps is also a major challenge in this case and the materials and the learning of the mobile applications need to increase the involvement of the renowned teachers with it in order to gain the trust of the parents (Khaddage, Müller and Flintoff 2016). The user interface is a major issue in the implementation as well as the simple form of it will enable larger number of people in getting associated with it. The digital applications usually incorporate several security measures in order to protect the data of a particular user but in spite of that the security and the privacy of the data and the user portal is a notable concern for the authority (Tsinakos and Ally 2013). The organization launching the concerned applications must make sure that the confidentiality and the safety of the data of its user is taken care in the appropriate manner and in doing so the organization can limit the amount of data to be stored in the portal. A market analysis on the average spending of the Australians in the education sector must be there in order to get the idea of the estimated price of the product otherwise it will be significantly difficult in order to implement the product and align it according to the expenditure of the Australians.

Conclusion:

On a concluding note it can be said that the social innovation has a major role in the betterment of the society and the increased amount of benefits that generate from the social innovation concept will be instrumental in easing out the difficulty of the people. The proposed social innovation concept is able to hit the apathy of the modern day students in taking the educational lessons owing to the lack of interest in digesting the pages. The new concept produces significant opportunities to the students to overcome the traditional barriers and increases the interest of them towards the new method of learning. Australia being a heavy spending country on the education sector will be a suitable choice for this sort of innovation and the proof of the fact that the government is spending less on the infrastructural development of the educational centres from the speech of Tanya Plibersek will makes significant space for the learning apps.

References:

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