Global Bay Areas Impact Lab: Cultivating Social Innovation Across the GBA, Tokyo Bay, and San Francisco Bay
Launched in Summer 2024, the Global Bay Areas Impact Lab is a new Social Innovation and Global Citizenship (SIGC) experiential programme that connects HKU Social Sciences undergraduates with vibrant social innovation ecosystems across the Greater Bay Area (GBA), Tokyo Bay, and San Francisco Bay. Over an intensive eight weeks, students explore how diverse cultural, economic, and policy contexts influence responses to shared challenges – ranging from sustainable urban development to equitable community design – and how social innovation can inspire and scale positive change.
This summer, the Lab brought together its second cohort on an exciting journey that combined seminars, project-based internships, and cross-cultural exchanges. The programme began with an orientation week at HKU and Sun Yat-sen University to ground students in GBA development and practical social innovation tools, followed by five-week placements with leading foundations, social enterprises, and corporate partners across the GBA. Working alongside our community partners, students delivered a spectrum of projects with authentic impact, including designing community programmes, creating impact stories, and visualizing system trends through data.
Building on their GBA insights and experiences, students then joined Waseda University for a one-week Tokyo Bay field trip to explore Japan’s social innovation pathways from grassroots to policy. They further engaged in virtual seminars with scholars from San Francisco Bay to examine evolving perspectives and critically reflect on the field’s future. The experience culminated in a Social Innovation Hackathon, where teams synthesized learning from all three regions into contextualized solutions for Hong Kong.
Reflecting on their journeys, students recognize that positive social transformation begins with the individual, and that remarkable progress is built from the accumulation of small changes. The Lab will continue to inspire students to act with passion and purpose in the GBA and beyond.