Centres of Innovation Network Impact Report (Writing)

Curious Public worked with Humber College to write an inaugural impact report for the college’s Centres of Innovation Network to showcase the Network’s impact on students, faculty and both industry and community partners and attract more of them in the future.

Humber College’s COI Network was launched in 2017. Their goal was to bring together students, faculty and industry partners to solve problems and work on projects with modern facilities and technologies. They had had some successful partnerships, but they had a challenge. They wanted to attract more partners for the COI Network, but were having trouble telling a cohesive story that included each of the five Centres of Innovation in the Network in a way that would attract more partners.

That’s why the COI Network reached out to Curious Public to craft an impact report that could showcase the COI Network’s benefits to partners and demonstrate its value, as well as preview Humber’s plan for what the COI Network would accomplish in years to come.

Curious Public started the project by conducting a series of interviews with faculty and past partners. Through the interviews, we found four key themes to follow.

You can do anything at Humber
COI’s are easy to get into with a low cost of failure
Key audiences aren’t aware of the program
Students get real experience, faculty get a new way of learning, businesses get help and future employees.

Curious also gained an important insight through the interviews. While partners were an important audience, Humber students and faculty were two additional equally important audiences. For the COI Network’s partnerships to succeed, it had to attract students and faculty to be part of its activities. That meant the report needed to showcase the positive impact the COI Network had not only for industry and community partners but for students and faculty as well.

With these themes and insights, Curious wrote Humber’s inaugural impact report on the state of the COI program and the college’s vision for the program’s future.