TELOS Assignment 4: Field Research on Good Practices (2023-24)
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This assignment is designed for those students who are not working on a local landscape context during the seminar period. We invite you to do desk research (i.e. use secondary data sources) to find out what others are already doing in the context of innovative landscape economy approaches and which good practices exist.
This research is guided by the following questions:
- What types of innovative approaches exist and how do they work?
- Which landscape sustainability challenge is addressed?
- Which individuals are behind those initiatives and what motivates them?
- What could you learn from the case?
Innovation approaches are, for example: innovative forms of cooperation between public, private and social sectors, market-oriented approaches such as social businesses, alternative organisation models (i.e. cooperatives, benefit corporations, foundations) or innovative landscape governance approaches.
What all have in common are innovative value propositions that respond to social and environmental needs that are rooted in the landscape and mitigate/reduce negative impacts.
You are asked to individually collect secondary data on an innovative landscape economy initiative and to summarise the information available by filling out the case study template.
How to find good cases?
There are several options to identify a social innovation project for your case study:
- Get inspiration by case study examples from previous social innovation courses.
- Research the regional and national media (newspaper, magazines etc.) for articles/reports on SEs.
- Research the internet for SEs in your region/country using keywords such as “social enterprise”, “social business”, “social impact”, etc. + the name of the region/country.
- Research online directories and databases of SEs in your region, e.g.
- Ashoka network
- betterplace.org
- european network of ecopreneurs
- European Commission – Social Economy
- Kiva
- Schwab Foundation
- Skoll Foundation
- Talk to people (family, friends, colleagues, etc.) whether they know SEs in your region.
Submission Time & Format
Write a brief report (about 5 pages including images and reference, excluding cover page) in which you summarise the information of your local case. You may concentrate on specific aspects of the case study. Attach supplementary information (e.g., graphical material) if available.
For structuring your paper, you may follow the content elements of the case study template.
Make sure you include a personal reflective dimension; this is part of the evaluation.
- Present your findings in class on December 11, 2023.
- Upload your report on the same day on ILIAS
If you take the 5 ECTS variant of the course, the combined evaluation of your report and the presentation will determine your seminar grade. In addition, assignment 1 needs to be done, but will not be graded.
Evaluation criteria for assignment 4
- Identification of the landscape system challenge addressed by the new model
- Correct and coherent translation of the good practice case into the social business model template
- Depth and quality of the personal reflection of the case
- Good time management and communication during team presentations
- Thoughtful response to questions during discussions
- Good writing style, meeting academic standards