Syllabus

D-Lab III is the third in the D-Lab trilogy of courses on "Development," "Design," and "Dissemination," focusing on disseminating innovations for the common good among underserved communities, especially in developing countries. Students acquire skills relating to building partnerships and piloting, financing, implementing, and scaling-up a selected innovation for the common good. The course is structured around MIT competitions: IDEAS, $100K, and Deshpande IdeasStream Innovation Showcase; and outside competitions: Ignite Clean Energy, Environmental Protection Agency P3: People, Prosperity and the Planet Student Design Competition for Sustainability, and World Bank Development Marketplace. The "theory" part of the course addresses diffusion of innovation, and the acquired "how-to" skills relate to building international collaborations and to piloting, implementing and scaling-up an innovation. The class draws lessons from success stories of social entrepreneurs, while also identifying challenges, unintended consequences and failures in implementing technologies, projects and policies. Topics include defining vision and strategy, social entrepreneurship, implementation models, mechanics of implementation, micro-financing, management and accounting, monitoring and evaluation, opportunities and challenges of targeting one's enterprise to developing country and "bottom of the pyramid" contexts. Students learn to "pitch" to potential backers and explore essential skill sets and tools that can support realization of their innovation. Assignments include an on-line forum discussion board, student-selected and led case study readings/class discussions, a honed, incrementally-improved, final proposal for realizing your dream innovation. Teams develop an idea, project or social business plan that is "ready to roll" by term's end.

Course Meeting Times

Lectures: 2 sessions / week, 1.5 hours / session

Prerequisites

None

Main Text

[DOI] Rogers, Everett M. Diffusion of Innovations. 5th ed. New York, NY: Free Press, 2003. ISBN: 9780743222099.

Case Studies

Yunus, Muhammad. Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty. New York, NY: PublicAffairs/Perseus Books, 2003. ISBN: 9781586481988.

Prahalad, C. K. The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Wharton School Publishing, 2006. ISBN: 9780131877290.

Course Policies and Requirements

Commitment

Implementing an innovation is first and foremost about commitment (and passion). Moreover, this is a class where your work is potentially impacting the lives of people around the world, thus we expect an appropriate level of commitment.

Attendance

Regular attendance in class is essential and is expected of all students. Students missing a class meeting should contact the instructors to make up the work.

Course Units and Hours

This is a nine-unit class: Three hours a week will be spent in class and the remaining six hours will be spent working on assignments, readings, and most especially, developing your innovation and implementation plan.

Courtesy

Please ensure that your phones, computers, PDAs, music, and/or pagers are turned off during class.

Academic Honesty

Students in this course will work in teams to develop their innovation. However, individual assignments must be completed individually. Plagiarism, the use of writings or ideas of another as one's own, is unacceptable. Special care should be taken not to borrow and modify materials taken from the Internet or any electronic or printed source. Any student who violates this code of academic honesty will be cited immediately.

Late Work Policy

We do not accept late work.

Evaluation and Grading

Assignments that are submitted on time will be assigned a letter grade ranging from A to D, and following the grading guidelines of MIT's Academic Procedures and Institute Regulations.

Assignment weights will be determined collaboratively by the end of the 3^rd Week of class, with the only qualification being that the two most heavily weighted assignments must not exceed 45% of the total course grade. (Preliminary weighting shown)

Participation

Active class participation is highly valued and graded. Class participation includes regular attendance in class and in planned meetings and events outside of class, involvement in class discussions, asking and answering questions in class, substantial participation in team exercises, team projects, and team presentations, leading one class case-study discussion during the semester and submitting reading reviews to the class online discussion forum board. Participation includes completing assigned reading and on-line discussion board on time, and being an active member of group discussions and team activities.

Case Study Tutorials

Students shall take turns leading one class in discussion of a selected case study. This will include the selection of the case, identification of quality readings (including not merely Web site URLs, but at least 1 peer-reviewed article and/or published article or selections from a book), preparation, in advance, of study questions and leading the class through presentation and engaged discussion. The reading assignment must be provided by the class leader at least 4 days prior to that class, so that students have time to read the assignment before class.

Class Online Discussion Forum Board

Students will be required to post a critical commentary based on weekly assigned readings to class online discussion forum. Commentaries are informal and will not be graded on grammar, spelling, etc., but should be clearly written and used to critically engage with the assigned materials. Commentaries can be short in length, for example, 1-2 paragraphs and should not exceed 500 words (around 1-2 pages, single spaced). Students are expected to submit their commentaries to the forum site by midnight on the evening (either Monday or Wednesday) of the day preceding the class for which readings are due. Students are expected to read each other's postings prior to class in order to prepare for the class discussion. Commentaries are expected on both the Instructor-assigned readings and the Case-Study readings.

Team Project

Working in groups, students will prepare a team project/proposal/ plan, an IDEAS Competition poster or other display materials, and a team final Microsoft® PowerPoint® presentation and pitch on their innovation. Also a simulation/prototype/model may be constructed. We expect each team to select their innovation/idea during the 1st two weeks of class and form a team. Each team will select a unique topic and each individual must contribute substantially to the team project. We will assign a single grade to each team project and final presentation and teams comprised of multiple D-Lab III classmates are strongly encouraged to engage in multiple competitions. The IDEAS competition proposal is due one day before Ses #18 (e-copy mailed to Susan Murcott. The final Microsoft® PowerPoint® presentation shall be submitted electronically and delivered in hardcopy to Susan Murcott no later than two days after Ses #25. However, teams are also be expected to meet earlier deadlines, based on the several MIT Competitions D-Lab III teams will enter (See accompanying schedule).

Group Presentations

Group presentations of up to 20 minutes in length will be scheduled during class times during the last week of classes. Please plan to develop a professional quality presentation and dress accordingly. You must use visual aid(s) in your presentation (such as Microsoft® PowerPoint®, slides, overheads, etc), and each individual in a team must participate in the presentation.

Final Exam

There will be no final exam. The team project is the final requirement.

Special Needs

Please advise the instructor early on of any special needs or disabilities so that appropriate accommodations can be made.

Competitions and Web sites

1. IDEAS (All D-Lab III teams enter IDEAS competition as a minimum requirement)
2. MIT $100K - Entrepreneurs for development track
3. Deshpande Center IdeaStream
4. Ignite Clean Energy
5. World Bank Development Marketplace
6. Environmental Protection Agency. "P3: People, Prosperity and the Planet Student Design Competition for Sustainability."

Feedback

This summary of the first year of D-Lab III, 2006, illustrates the success of students in applying the lessons taught in the course to contemporary global problems. (PDF)