Social Entrepeneurship Summitt

Join a stellar cast of speakers at The Social Entrepreneurship Summit, including opening keynote Joel Solomon, CEO of Renewal and Executive Director of the Endswell Foundation, will be presenting on his experience as a leading investor in Canada's social purpose companies. Joel will be introduced by Tamara Vrooman, Chief Executive Officer of Vancity, both of whom will be linked via video conference, live from BC's inaugural Social Enterprise Summit.

Another keynote speaker will be Tamzin Ractliffe, the founder of GreaterGood South Africa and visionary behind the Global Social Investment Exchange (GSIX). A seasoned social entrepreneur with an impressive track record, Tamzin is delighted to introduce the concept of the GSIX to Canada based on its potential to galvanize large and sustainable investments into worthwhile social ventures while achieving meaningful and measurable change.

Other speakers include Dr. Frances Westley, Al Etmanski, Mary Gordon, Peter Nares, Geoff Cape, Tonya Surman, Marty Donkervoort, Barb Steele, Jonathan Loudon, Dev Aujla, Julia Moulden, David Galenson, Nick Temple, and Nigel Biggar.

The 2008 Social Entrepreneurship Summit will:

• Honour the contributions of those who have been working in the field of Social Entrepreneurship
• Celebrate successes being achieved across the Nation
• Recognize that there's no one single approach to this movement
• Encourage lifelong innovation
• Continue the momentum for future initiatives and partnerships

This year, the Summit is being held as part of Entrepreneurship Week Canada (EWC), November 17-22, the country's first ever week dedicated to Entrepreneurship.  

Social Finance Forum

The Social Finance Forum is Canada's summit on Social Finance bringing together pioneers, practitioners, and mainstream market makers.

As social and environmental pressures continue to mount at home and abroad, so too have financial innovations to power the solutions. Learn from local and global experts on social finance products and policy, and catch-up on the progress that's been made over the past year since our first sold-out forum.

At this years forum you can also expect to:

• Explore practical real-world examples
• Network with peers across Canada and the world
• Discover strategic and commercial opportunities to deploy social finance in your organization.

This year's forum will be held in conjunction with MaRS' Social Entrepreneurship Summit as part of Entrepreneurship Week Canada. Forum participants are also invited to attend the Summit and our joint reception on the evening of the 17th.

Get a pulse on social finance in Canada and internationally; featuring speakers from the fields of finance, social housing, community power and community development; we will explore the present state and future of our social finance marketplace with highlights from Canadian and international practitioners such as Nancy Neamtan, Don Fairbairn and Michael Swack.

Registration information for these events is found here http://ses-08.eventbrite.com/. MaRS' Social Entrepreneurship Summit is an invite only event.