At last week’s Second Annual Undergraduate Social Impact Conference, Iqbal Quadir said, “Things are changing,” in reference to world economies. But the conference showed that the methods and instruments of social impact are changing as well.
On Friday, the Wharton Dean’s Undergraduate Advisory Board and the Social Impact Task Force presented the conference, emphasizing improvement and innovative ideas for tackling social injustices.
The conference included six events from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., with opening remarks by Georgette Chapman-Phillips, vice dean of the Wharton Undergraduate School, and keynote speaker Dan Pallotta, founder of Springboard and Pallotta TeamWorks.
Approximately 30 audience members attended each talk, which carried a conversational atmosphere as speakers encouraged participation. More than 250 undergraduate and graduate students registered for the conference.
Tori Hogan, founder of Beyond Good Intentions, led the case study “The Future of International Aid: Are Good Intentions Sufficient?” She described the three largest issues that social impact faces today: lack of accountability, waste of money and cultural insensitivity.
“My advice is accountability to the people in need, not the donors,” she said, encouraging non-profits.
Iqbal Quadir, founder and director of Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, gave the keynote address: “Bottom-up Entrepreneurship for Development and Democracy.”
Quadir advocates utilizing mobile phones as the instrument for empowering ordinary citizens in low-income countries. During his speech, Quadir debunked popular myths concerning economic power and emphasized “dispersion of resources creates progress.”
Many students remained after the sessions to speak personally with the presenters. College senior Eisha Udeshi explained, “I came to this because I’m interested in learning different ways that people have either thought about or addressed social impact.”
Juhi Heda, co-chair of Wharton Dean’s Undergraduate Advisory Board, said, “We wanted to fund a co-curricular opportunity for students in all schools interested in social impact, but unleashed in different ways.” She stressed, “Although Wharton funded, it’s an inter-school collaboration.”
As the conference approached an end, Udeshi shared that she felt a strong sense of community.
“I have more hope seeing people not only thinking about changes but actually taking steps toward making those changes,” she said.
