Solar Powered Medical Equipment from Dayton's Creative Class

In early March, under the leadership of SOCHE, Richard, Steven, Lou, Rana, and I worked with 32 catalysts in Dayton, Ohio. The energy of the people, the strength of the art community, the leading universities, and the culture of innovation (from the Wright Brothers to Wright-Patterson) made for an exciting couple of days.

I recently came across a great example of the Dayton's creative assets in action. This article from the University of Dayton highlights the winner of their recent business plan competition.

From the piece:

Salud del Sol, an innovative new business from a team of University of Dayton students aimed at bringing the 'health of the sun' to medical treatment in developing countries, took home the $10,000 first prize to help get the venture off the ground.

Winning the 2008 University of Dayton Business Plan Competition, the team of Lauren Dokes, Lori Hanna, Daniel Hensel and Anna Young created a business plan to develop and market solar cookers and solar-powered sterilizers.

Salud del Sol tapped other expertise at the University including engineering, international development and social entrepreneurship, according to project member Lori Hanna, a mechanical engineering major. The project – the basis of her senior honors thesis – grew from an internship in rural Nicaragua through UD 's Engineers in Technical Humanitarian Opportunities of Service-learning (ETHOS) program.

"Nurses have to travel to bigger health centers or hospitals to use sterilizers, sometimes traveling long distances by bus and spending precious time and money to have access to the equipment," she said.

This type of social entrepreneurship is becoming more and more of a calling card/career choice of members of the creative class and places that offer combinable creative assets -- including universities, mega region/international linkages, entrepreneurial institutions, and scientific talent -- will see sustainable growth and improvements in quality of place.

Who's Your Google?

We (Me, Richard, Avi from Google, Greg from Basic Books) are off to the Manhattan Googleplex this afternoon for the book launch of Who's Your City?  If you are attending or attended the speech, post your comments or questions here...

Happy Birthday, Lego!

Today, the Lego Brick turns 50!  Looking pretty good for something that old.  Props to Google for celebrating the event with a special logo.

As something that has triggered almost as much creativity as the crayon and the empty  cardboard box, it's something worthy of a mention on this blog.

Lego factoids:

• There are about 62 LEGO bricks for every one of the world's 6 billion inhabitants.

• Children around the world spend 5 billion hours a year playing with LEGO bricks.

• More than 400 million people around the world have played with LEGO bricks.

• LEGO bricks are available in 53 different colors.

• 19 billion LEGO elements are produced every year.

• 2.16 million LEGO elements are molded every hour, or 36,000 per minute.

• More than 400 billion LEGO bricks have been produced since 1949.

• Two eight-stud LEGO bricks of the same color can be combined in 24 different ways.

• Three eight-stud bricks can be combined in 1,060 ways

See the full set and a cool Lego timeline here.

posted by Kevin Stolarick

Good and Good for You

The latest issue of Journal of Health and Social Behavior reports on a study that looked at people's health and work.  It turns out that "creative" work is good for your health and that employees who have more control over their daily activities and can do challenging work are likely to be in better health.

“The most important finding is that creative activity helps people stay healthy,” said lead author John Mirowsky, a sociology professor with the Population Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin. “Creative activity is nonroutine, enjoyable, and provides opportunity for learning and for solving problems. People who do that kind of work, whether paid or not, feel healthier and have fewer physical problems.”

And although people who work give up some independence, the study found that being employed does lead to better health. One thing that surprised us was that the daily activities of employed persons are more creative than those of non-employed persons of the same sex, age, and level of education,” Mirowsky said.

The study, which appears in the December issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, comprised 2,592 adults who responded to a 1995 national telephone survey and were followed up in 1998. The survey addressed general health and physical functioning, as well as how people spent their time on a daily basis and whether their work, even if unpaid, gave them a chance to learn new things or do things they enjoy.

“The health advantage of being somewhat above average in creative work [in the 60th percentile] versus being somewhat below average [in the 40th percentile] is equal to being 6.7 years younger,” Mirowsky said. It is also equal to having two more years of education or 15 times greater household income, he added.

Although the authors didn’t examine specific job positions that may confer this health advantage, professions considered not to involve a “creative” environment were those such as assembly lines.

Rather, jobs that are high-status, with managerial authority, or that require complex work with data generally provide more access to creative work, Mirowsky said. However, “People with a wide variety of jobs manage to find ways to make them creative. People with higher levels of education tend to have more creative activities, paid or not. Something about education helps individuals to find creative things to do and get the resources to do them.”

Sub required to get to the full journal article, but the American Sociological Association's press release is available here.

posted by Kevin Stolarick

Shameless Promotion

But, it was a really fun event, part of a Toronto series on the CreativeCity.

They posted a summary here.  It's interesting and it does reflect on both Toronto and why we are here.

posted by Kevin Stolarick

Want It All

Kevin Stolarick of the Creative Class Group and Lisa Taber of FortiusOne have paired up to develop a series of 'heat maps' that show the hottest places in the country based on your lifestage and some preselected criteria.  The maps allow you to zoom in on specific parts of the country or see how your current city compares to others.

Want It All Map

Place to Retire

Kevin Stolarick of the Creative Class Group and Lisa Taber of FortiusOne have paired up to develop a series of 'heat maps' that show the hottest places in the country based on your lifestage and some preselected criteria.  The maps allow you to zoom in on specific parts of the country or see how your current city compares to others.

Place to Retire Map 

Come back Monday to see next week's map: Want It All

Loyal Employees Stay Home

Andrea Coombes of the WSJ (sub req'd) wrote a piece last week highlighting a recent survey that found, "workers who telecommute from home or elsewhere, while still a very small portion of the work force, report the highest levels of satisfaction with their jobs and loyalty to their employers." The article has some great insights and mini-cases. Longer snippet below.

posted by David

Retired, Not Dead

Kevin Stolarick of the Creative Class Group and Lisa Taber of FortiusOne have paired up to develop a series of 'heat maps' that show the hottest places in the country based on your lifestage and some preselected criteria.  The maps allow you to zoom in on specific parts of the country or see how your current city compares to others.

Retired, Not Dead Map

Come back Monday to see next week's map: Place to Retire

Good Second Home

Kevin Stolarick of the Creative Class Group and Lisa Taber of FortiusOne have paired up to develop a series of 'heat maps' that show the hottest places in the country based on your lifestage and some preselected criteria.  The maps allow you to zoom in on specific parts of the country or see how your current city compares to others.

Good Second Home Map

Come back Monday to see next week's map: Retired, Not Dead