Last winter, the University of Winnipeg’s Business Administration department offered the first Canadian undergraduate course in co-operative management.

Its instructor, Monica Adeler, was honoured in July for her work connecting academic research on co-ops to practical questions in the local community.

Adeler received the John Logue ACE Award, established last year by the international Association of Cooperative Educators.

Her research on public policy affecting co-operative development in Spain, Italy and Quebec helped shape Manitoba’s government policy decisions. One result is the Co-operative Development Tax Credit introduced last year. Adeler worked in partnership with the Manitoba
Co-operative Association (MCA) and SEED Winnipeg.

For several years, Adeler was project administrator for the social economy initiative of the Winnipeg Inner City Research Alliance (WIRA) at the Institute of Urban Studies. The five-year project provided funding for research partnerships with local organizations involved in the social economy.

“The university often finds a student or assistant who’s actually going to do the research. The university provides a professor to guide the student, and the community organization provides expertise,” explained Adeler. “It tends to be very productive because it’s not one-sided.”

“ The U of W business school has identified its own market niche, which is attracting business students that tend to think a little bit outside of the box.

Monica Adeler, instructor, University of Winnipeg

The social economy, according to WIRA, includes not-for-profit enterprises and organizations that use the tools and some of the methods of business to provide social, cultural, economic and health services to communities.

A co-op is one example.

Co-ops can be non-profit or for-profit, but always serve both economic and social purposes. Co-operatives are owned and democratically run by their members, and they balance the need for profitability with the needs of their members and the wider interests of the community, the MCA says.

The U of W’s co-op management course introduces how a co-op’s objectives and legal structure differ from a conventional business, then shows how mainstream management practices can be adapted to fit a co-operative model.

Adeler said there is a reason the course is offered here and not at the U of M.

“The U of W business school has identified its own market niche, which is attracting business students that tend to think a little bit outside of the box.”

Along with traditional business courses, they offer non-profit management, social enterprise management, business ethics and the new co-op management course. Adeler said there may be more to come.

“There is some conversation between the business school and the co-operative sector to expand the curriculum on co-operatives,” she said.

Published in Volume 66, Number 9 of The Uniter (October 26, 2011)