Northwestern Samar state university cocreation programs

The Northwest Samar State University (NWSSU) Graduate School, in partnership with the Bamboo Impact Lab, Bridging Leadership Institute, Blue Economy Lab and the Philippine Coast Guard, and Ateneo de Davao University, invites faculty, graduate students, and extension leaders to take part in an innovation ecosystem journey. This program is designed to enable university-based teams to co-create impact-driven, community-rooted extension programs with partner LGUs and local stakeholders.

Grounded in Bridging Leadership and Harvard's Problem-Driven Iterative Adaptation (PDIA) methodologies, participants will collaboratively strengthen their local innovation ecosystems through real-world application, benchmarking, and iterative learning cycles.

Program Goals

• Institutionalize adaptive, collaborative innovation practices across NWSSU’s extension programs and partner communities.

• Develop high-impact extension initiatives that reflect local needs and are sustained by community co-ownership.

• Support teams in building and activating local innovation ecosystems in partnership with LGUs, civil society, and academic units.

• Enable learning from other universities and innovation hubs through structured inter-city benchmarking and field exchange.
  
  
  

What Makes Innovation-Oriented Extension Work Different?

Leadership Capacity Building
Through facilitated Bridging Leadership Labs, team members will cultivate the relational, political, and strategic skills needed to navigate adaptive challenges.

Co-Creation with LGUs and Communities
Each team will co-develop an extension impact program with local government partners and key community actors, applying Bridging Leadership to build shared ownership.

PDIA-Fueled Experimentation
Participants will move from diagnosing complex local challenges to launching small-scale, high-learning interventions over multiple iterative cycles.

Ecosystem Benchmarking
Teams will assess and improve their innovation ecosystems using the ecosystem strengthening framework, learning from both local realities and peer cities.

Expected Team Outputs

• A Co-Created Extension Impact Program implemented in partnership with an LGU

• A Community Involvement and Stakeholder Engagement Plan

• A series of mini-experiments with documented results and learnings

• A Local Innovation Ecosystem Assessment Report 

• A final Sustainability and Scale-Up Plan

AdvanceD learning

For those who want to start learning the concepts, you may review these learning activities on your own.

1. Introduction to Bridging Leadership Circles

2. How to Facilitate a BL Circle

3. Leadership Journey Activity

4. Intro to Public Narrative Technique