Civility and Social Impact

The Winston Center collaborated with the Lowell Humanities Series to bring Krista Tippett, Peabody Award-winning broadcaster and journalist, to talk about the Adventure on Civility. Tippett, host of the NPR program On Being, focused on the tenor of public discourse in today’s environment. She pondered what it means to be truly human and asked, Can one have truly meaningful conversations with others that hold opposing political views? Absolutely yes, Tippett argued. “Conversation conducted with openness and civility can be transformative.”

Marking the first year of Boston College’s new interdisciplinary minor in Managing for Social Impact and the Public Good, the Center collaborated with the Center for Social Innovation and the Institute for the Liberal Arts to present a symposium on Leading for Social Impact. The keynote speakers were Sarah B. Smith '76, director of the Mercy Partnership Fund, Mercy Investment Services, a company that practices socially responsible investing globally to help create a more just and sustainable world, and Ben Hecht, president and CEO of Living Cities, which works through cross-sector partnerships to dramatically improve the economic well-being of low-income people in urban areas across America. The three concurrent panel discussions, Social Impact Investing and Finance; Community Led Social Justice; and Innovations in Socially Responsible Enterprise, featured speakers from Social Innovation Forum, Think Impact, Social Finance, Keene Advisors, and Haley House, among others. The afternoon also celebrated the book launch of Managing for Social Impact: Innovations in Responsible Enterprise, co-edited by Professor Mary Cronin of the Carroll School of Management and Professor Tiziana Dearing of the Graduate School of Social Work and co-director of the Center for Social Innovation.