As part of the Community Animator project, four University of Alberta Occupational Therapy students worked with Action Lab and residents at Edgemont Flats to explore new approaches to community engagement. Their project looked at how asset mapping could be used not just to identify community strengths, but as a way for residents to connect, participate, and learn more about one another. The students share what they tried, what they learned, and how the project changed their approach to working with communities.

Following this year's Canadian Forum for Social Innovation, Skills Society's Director of Development and Community Engagement, Annand Ollivierre, reflects on conversations about talent, systems change, and the role of lived experience in addressing complex challenges. His reflections consider what it takes to build stronger systems by recognizing different forms of knowledge and creating space for meaningful collaboration.

Season two of the Wicked Complex podcast is here, and Episode One has officially dropped. This season, Absurdly Hopeful: How Play and Creativity Can Crack Open New Futures, explores how imagination, humour, and absurdity can become essential tools for meaningful social change. We’re kicking things off with a conversation about why play is not a distraction from the work. It may be what sustains it.

Part 3 of a 3 part blog series.

Part 2 of a 3 part blog series.

Part 1 of a 3 part blog series.