News and Blog

Does social enterprise mean business?

The financial crisis has been identified as the catalyst for the tremendous growth seen in social enterprise – organisations that have social purpose but rely on the functioning of the market to maintain long term viability. Social enterprises are thought to have grown from an estimated 5,000 in the late 1990s to an estimated 70,000…

Charities are playing a growing role in schools – but is that a good thing?

WISERD Education Director, Professor Sally Power, explores the situation in this blog post. While there have been growing concerns about the permeation of business in education, relatively little attention has been paid to how schools are increasingly engaged in the “business” of fundraising for charities. At WISERD Education, we have been examining the increasingly close…

Tracking progress on the government’s disability and employment commitments

WISERD’s Professor Melanie Jones blogs for The Conversation with Professor Victoria Wass, Cardiff University. Disability affects the lives of millions of people in the UK. With about one in six working-age people currently reporting some kind of disability, around 70% are either working, looking for work or want to work. Good quality work is important…

Does community cohesion matter when it comes to library accessibility?

From realms of fantasy to political intrigue, libraries are places where people of all ages can immerse themselves in fiction and non-fiction alike. Sadly, ever-tightening local government budgets have necessitated changing levels of provision for many of our beloved local public services. For some libraries this means reduced opening hours or even forced closures when…

Engaging with the voluntary sector at gofod3

‘Have you done any research on how to recruit volunteers?’; ‘Can I use the WISERD DataPortal to map my members?’. These were just some of the questions we were asked when WISERD returned to this year’s gofod3, the WCVA’s annual gathering of the third sector. We had a stand in the exhibition hall, along with 60 other organisations…