Open 2013: Frameworks for Interdisciplinary, Experiential Entrepreneurship Courses

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Farley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation

Frameworks for Interdisciplinary and Experiential Entrepreneurship Courses

NCIIA Open

Michael Marasco & Todd Warren

March 22, 2013

Farley Center Goals

• Deliver interdisciplinary and experiential education that exposes students to the entire product and business development process within an entrepreneurship and innovation context

• Provide outside of classroom services/experiences that leverage our in classroom efforts to empower students, faculty and alumni to be successful entrepreneurs and innovators

Accolades

• Inc. Magazine named NUvention one of top 10 entrepreneurship classes

• NUvention Web student Nikhil Sethi named one of 9 Forbes College All-Star Entrepreneurs

Almost $2 million won in 2012

• Numat wins over $1.5 million in:• Clean Energy Trust• Rice-Mimas $100K• DOE

• Wins $100K at TechWeek Launch this past Monday

Accolades

Northwestern is the most entrepreneurial college in the MidwestForbes

Accolades

NUvention one of 4 classes highlighted in VentureBeat

Companies Created

Are we going back to the beginning?

Cases/Majors

Field Studies/InternshipsHybrids/ NUvention

Incubators

Entrepreneurship Ed is Evolving From:

Where Are We Learning From?

What is NUvention?

• Interdisciplinary/Experiential• What students are asking for• Alums with deep experience chair classes• Evolution of case based learning• Best simulation of creating a product/service and business• More rigorous than an incubator• Start-ups are not a goal but nice follow-on validation• Expanding to Digital Media and Nano

High Level Framework

NUvention

Students

Alumni Faculty

Industry

History

• Student idea in 2006• Dean level support• Key faculty support• Key Alum• Needed Organizer• NUvention Medical launched September

2007• 6 Classes today

Guiding Principles

• Alum Chair• Alum Advisory Board-1 or 2 face-to face

meetings/Mentors• Faculty Lead• Consistent branding and infrastructure• Start-Up Weekends/Pre-Class assignments• Team Building• Uniform Governance

Challenges

• Governance• Faculty Appointments/Comp• Funding• Faculty Leadership/Faculty Team Size• Unified Marketing Message• Tech Transfer• Mentorship/Coaching• School Politics• Overhead/Cost

Logistics/Infrastructure

• Governance Centralized vs Decentralized• Medical Case Study

• Tech Support• Class Web Sites• Online tools for status, project mgt, business model canvas

• Adopted LaunchPad Central this year

• Dedicated Staff Support• Cross Listing/Degree Applicability• Department Level Liaisons

Lessons Learned

• Alum Role Key- Attend Todd’s Session Sat @10• Chair• Advisory board

• Class by Committee Does Not Work• Faculty Lead

• Creating Student Teams is Challenging• Different Goals-Committed to start-up, learning, not sure• Student created teams do not work as well faculty formed.

• Interdisciplinary Works• Hard to Tell Students Apart

Contact Info:

Michael A. Marasco, Directormmarasco@northwestern.edu

@mmarasco847.467.6347

Todd Warrentodd@toddwinc.com

Farley Center for Entrepreneurship & InnovationMcCormick School of Engineering

Northwestern University2133 Sheridan Road, 2.331

Evanston, IL 60208

Open 2013: Frameworks for Interdisciplinary, Experiential Entrepreneurship Courses

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