During the months of September and October 2018, the IBM Corporate Service Corps (CSC) team will partner with four Nova Scotia institutions to develop projects that are tied to the province’s development goals and will benefit the Halifax, and greater Nova Scotian communities.
This year the city of Halifax, located in maritime province of Nova Scotia, will host Canada’s inaugural Canadian CSC mission. The CSC team’s projects will focus on the development of tech-based and ocean-related education programs, improved delivery services and accessibility for youth, students, and immigrants. The four leading Nova Scotia partner organizations are:
(1) The Nova Scotia Department of Education and Early Childhood Development
(2) Institute for Ocean Research Enterprise (IORE) — a collaborative facility for applied innovation in the ocean sector. The IBM sub-team will be working from the Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship location in Dartmouth.
(3) Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) — serving the province through a network of 13 campuses and three community learning centres
(4) Immigrant Services Association of Nova Scotia (ISANS) — the largest immigrant-serving agency in Atlantic Canada.
The 16 IBM consultants have begun preparations for the projects, having commenced an intensive training and skills-building preparatory process for their deployment. These daring innovators hail from all corners of the globe — Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Denmark, India, Philippines and Romania — and will leverage their unique technological, analytical, and design skills to assist in solving some of the Halifax community’s novel issues and initiatives.
For this CSC program IBM has partnered with its long standing collaborator, Digital Opportunity Trust — DOT (www.dotrust.org), a Canadian NGO that has more than 16 years of experience designing and implementing youth and women empowerment programs. For the past decade, DOT has worked as the implementing partner for corporate volunteering programs for international companies, having delivered over 90 CSC project to date in 22 countries around the globe, assisting IBM in its development of innovative solutions to pressing community challenges. At DOT, we implement and facilitate the CSC program, which means that we set up the IBMers with meaningful and impactful opportunities to be daring social innovators in local communities — applying their skills and knowledge in support of local organizations facing complex challenges.
After months of working with all the various stakeholders — it is finally coming together. In less than three weeks the team that I have been chatting with weekly will be here! I can’t wait to give them a big East Coast welcome!
