The Grameen Creative Lab is in an ongoing dialogue and exchange with universities and assists them in incorporating social business into their respective academic environments. The GCL offers the following services for academic institutions:

1) Seeding: includes all activities which could be seen as the first starting point to engage with social business, such as:

Speeches: GCL holds speeches and lectures at universities and conferences about social business related topics. The GCL team has already held many speeches at universities all over the world.

Social Business Labs: These are 1 or 2 day workshops about social business where participants learn about social business and develop their own social business ideas and business models in a highly interactive way.

Apart from this universities can engage in many other activities including participation in social business idea contests, joint publications with GCL, etc.

2) University Network: The Grameen Creative Lab will also foster exchange and collaboration with universities by establishing the Global Social Business Network Universities starting in 2011, which will offer a variety of benefits for its members, ranging from monthly newsletters, to bi-monthly calls, GCL event discounts, internship programs and many other benefits. Stay tuned for more information about our university network.

3) Consulting: GCL provides consulting services to assist academic institutions in exploring social business and in implementing social business activities. The consulting activities focus on three main pillars: putting social business into practice, teaching, and conducting research on different aspects of social business. Our services include consulting support e.g. for setting up a Social Business Chair or Institute, developing curricula, organizing conferences, international social business idea competitions and field trips for faculty members and students amongst others.