Energy, environment, food production, and healthcare are some of the top challenges in the world that are being confronted by the faculty and students at the University of Wisconsin – Madison and other campuses of the UW system as part of a study abroad class on social entrepreneurship being taught at Oxford University this August for thirty students.

The course is developed and taught by Brad Barham, a professor of agricultural and applied economics, Eric Giordano of the Wisconsin Institute for Public Policy, John Hoffmire of the Wisconsin School of Business and Eli Call, a semi-retired entrepreneur. Students will be engaged in hands-on activities with practitioners in the field and participate in small groups to assist and learn from a wide range of social enterprises. These types of learning experiences give students the knowledge of how people in other parts of the world define problems and their solutions differently.

As they plan to spice their education with international content and practice, the students are looking forward to living in England for three weeks and developing a greater sense of how social entrepreneurship fits into the broader social change context.