From the Director

In last month’s Director’s Note, I commented on the unique spirit of civic engagement and collaboration that exists in North Carolina and, in large part, drives our state’s progress. Exemplary of our cross-sector cooperation, last week IEI hosted a Leadership Retreat in Greensboro to help develop our newest program of work.

In previous years, Retreat participants were asked to address concrete issues facing North Carolina: infrastructure, energy, and taxes. This year IEI challenged stakeholders from nonprofits, academia, business and government to give meaning to the slogan “A State of Minds” by focusing on the role creativity could play in our state’s development. 

In the past, our economy was built on things – tobacco, textiles, and furniture – but in the future, creativity may be North Carolina’s single greatest comparative advantage. In fact, how we capitalize on our imagination could well determine our state’s success in the global economy.  Why? Because Creativity improves labor and capital and extends resources.

Several themes emerged from the discussion that will become the basis for our work as we move forward.

1. Creativity can be either stimulated or stifled in our learning environments.  Our educational systems must lead the creativity effort, and their success will largely determine North Carolina’s ability to sustain the economies of areas of the state with dramatically aging populations and those with disproportionate numbers of underperforming students.  That said, classrooms can’t do it all. Creativity is a lifelong virtue requiring lifelong learning strategies.

2. Creativity calls for, but is challenged by, heterogeneity.  North Carolina’s continued transformation into a much more diverse state requires new, highly-developed social networks that offer individuals, businesses, and communities the opportunities to collectively generate new ideas.  Indeed, our developing diversity can be celebrated and conscripted in ways that build “creative communities.”

3. Creativity requires the right combination of hands off and government support.  Public leaders may not control creativity, but they can create an environment in which it can flourish.  Useful inputs include physical spaces, social connections, time and money.

Next month, I’ll share more about why creativity matters to North Carolina, particularly as the recession wreaks havoc with our economic landscape. In the meantime, IEI continues to hold informal stakeholder meetings across the state in an effort to organize our Working Groups – the next component of our model public policy process – set to begin this fall. These Working Groups will help to refine our program in preparation for a much larger vetting process at our 25th Annual Emerging Issues Forum scheduled for February 8-9, 2010 at the Raleigh Convention Center.

As always, please contact us at institute@ncsu.edu with your ideas for how to move forward with this new and exciting program of work.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Anita