Open Minis: Networks

Adapting NSF I-Corps as a Tool for Teaching Entrepreneurship and Business Leadership in a Novel Translational Medicine Graduate Student Program

Our Open Mini presentation will showcase how we adapted the NSF I-Corps methodology into a newly created Translational Medicine Masters degree program. Specifically, we will highlight how we successfully integrated a 15-week, for-credit, experiential learning paradigm into the overall year-long Masters program. In an accompanying paper, we will present the results by showing the impact the process had on student learnings; the biggest take away being that as a result of such experiential learning and customer discovery, students then re-engineered their designs when building their prototypes of medical devices. We not only succeeded in translating clinical findings from the bedside back to the bench, but we conclude that this new paradigm, when offered alongside a biodesign class, significantly affects the ultimate usefulness of the medical product.

Presenters:
Philip Loew, City University of New York
Jessica Fields, City University of New York

Strengthening Invention Education Pathways Through Network Development

The Lemelson-MIT Program has been working for more than twenty years to celebrate outstanding inventors and inspire young people to pursue creative lives and careers through invention. The work to date has given us deep insights into the support middle and high school students and their teachers need to develop creative inventions and inventive mindsets. It has also helped us learn about the value students, especially those from underrepresented groups, place on their experience with InvenTeams and the self-confidence and insights they generate for themselves as they participate in the process. At the college level and above, it has helped us discover universities who excel at giving young people and faculty the support needed for invention and innovation.

Presenters:
Stephanie Couch, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Leigh Estabrooks, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

think[box] Innovation Fellows Summer Pilot

The goal of the pilot was to provide exposure to project-based industry collaborations where students had an opportunity to experience first-hand how innovation and entrepreneurial thinking can lead to economic and market advancement. This presentation highlights the approach taken and outcomes, along with suggestions if the program were to be offered again at Case Western Reserve University or other institutions of higher education.

Presenter:
Tiffany McNamara, Case Western Reserve University

Making Place: Developing a course in innovation practice for all

In developing an interdisciplinary minor in entrepreneurship that aspires to have broad appeal and provide students with the fundamental skills to think and act innovatively, the resource realities at a small school presented some challenges. One outcome was the creation of a course in Design Thinking and Innovation. The course, team-taught by faculty from engineering and architecture, was offered to the entire campus and attracted students from six unique programs in its initial offering. Throughout the course, students explored creativity as the ability to turn ideas into action. After practicing methods in the context of two comprehensive projects, the students applied the foundational exercises to the development of novel, elegant, relevant, use-centered solutions to student-identified needs. The creative combination of existing resources to achieve I&E-focused learning outcomes and the lessons learned from the first iteration should help inspire others as they work to achieve similar goals within their communities.

Presenter:
David Feinauer, Norwich University

Track: Topics in I&E