About Us

The Community Innovators Lab (CoLab) is a center for research and practice within the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP).

CoLab supports the development and use of knowledge from excluded communities to deepen civic engagement, improve community practice, inform policy, mobilize community assets, and generate shared wealth.

We believe that community knowledge can drive powerful innovation and can help make markets an arena for supporting social justice.

CoLab facilitates the interchange of knowledge and resources between MIT and community organizations. We engage students to be practitioners of this approach to community change and sustainability.

CoLab's Focus:

Democratic Engagement
Shared Wealth Generation
Urban Sustainability

History

CoLab has its roots in the MIT Community Fellows Program, a 25-year effort of (DUSP), to support community activists' learning through campus-based coursework, learning and building networks. The Community Fellows Program evolved into the Center for Reflective Community Practice (CRCP), which drew on the development expertise of DUSP faculty and students, and used reflective practice to help communities and leaders "know what they know." CRCP aimed to improve the lives of those most marginalized by our society by mining the knowledge of residents in low-income and marginalized communities, for their own use. Building on the principles of reflective practice, CoLab seeks to leverage a range of community assets, including community knowledge. We work with communities to develop living examples of social, economic, and ecological innovation.