Priorities:Illinois Institute of Technology Student Priorities

Strategy #1: Finding Methods of Appeal to All Students That Introduce the Potential of Entrepreneurship

Team Leader: Callie Joncas 

Tactic #1: Integrate a Circuit of Exchange Between Students Throughout Campus

• The opportunity to present ideas visually across campus is already available. But with a major focus mainly on only innovative projects that have already been fully developed, mostly through a program with specific guidelines and requirements. The display of a potentially marketable idea to a diverse audience may open up a window for unique feedback and constant advice. And as an entrepreneur would do in the real-world, this type of setting will require the student to develop a model for their product and attempt gain the interest of others for the acquirement of resources and sponsorship for making big change happen with the encouragement of others. This could be in the form of a weekly idea board that follows the theme of scenarios that relate to the experiences students have on campus that are frequent and in need of a solution. It could be an event that provides materials necessary for students to experiment and brainstorm openly while gaining skills in creative thinking, collaboration, and product development. Or it could even be something as simple as a weekly meeting for students and faculty to identify and agree on opportunities to innovate and integrate entrepreneurship into various aspects of campus that have areas in obvious need of improvement, and also could be pictured as evolving from the students viewpoint as a result of entrepreneurial themes.

​ Progressive Milestones

• Investigation of target points of impact: completed with an enthusiastic and relevant faculty member along with interested peers - March 2015
• Identification of target audience: completed with the opinion of peers and acknowledgement of common appeal - March 2015
• Feedback from target audience - May 2015
• Project preparation - October 2015
• Building on our original idea - January 2016
• Implementation onto university campus - 2016-2017

Tactic #2: An Interdisciplinary Course That Utilizes Current Events or Workplace Scenarios

• The impact of a course that teaches students to think of solutions relative to what today's world demands and to acknowledge the expectations in a actual job setting could prove highly beneficial. The benefits could range from increased student motivation and excitement for fulfilling career goals to a deeper understanding of the importance of new ideas in bettering the systems and environments relative to the students’ major which will fuel the future. The collaboration involved will also put an important emphasis on the importance of peer feedback and consideration of others ideas to come to the most practical solutions. When the students ideas are tested in project form, they will also come to the realization of how crucial it is to search out potential flaws and acknowledge previous failures to learn what methods to avoid and how to design under constraints and specific techniques. This will provide training geared towards overcoming implications and meeting modern day performance standards. This will ultimately provide a bridge from college to the real-world.

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​ Progressive Milestones

• Curriculum overview:Talk with professors and identify an ideal classroom set-up to shape this course - March 2015
• Discussion with sponsors and team members who are optimistic about the benefits of this course type - May 2015
• Brainstorm a curriculum - October 2015
• identify candidates of interest for this course - January 2016
• Open up the idea to create awareness - February 2016
• Launch a course following the set-up described - 2016-2017

Tactic #3: A Technological Platform That Serves an Important Function in On Campus-Life

• An implementation of a network for the ease and benefit of students that carries easy accessibility and handles a multitude of functions could be appraised by any student.  This could potentially be a platform for information storage, scheduling and reminders, and even an idea pool for campus events, study strategies, and social gatherings. This could also be a good aid for helping keeping students notified about what’s been happening in the college community and easier awareness can be spread like wildfire about situations that demand immediate attention and action. Acknowledging the successful study strategies of  others  through a feedback loop could enhance the learning experience and give struggling students hope in finding new methods to help them gain a deeper understanding in abstract academic material.

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​​ Progressive Milestones

• Get public appeal - March 2015
• Define the primary function - May 2015
• Acknowledge the set up - October 2015
• Join with others to put things together - March 2016
• Notify the target audience - April 2016
• Fully implement the platform - 2017

Strategy #2: Introduce of New Infrastructure

Tactic #1: Create a Hub in the Heart of an Area on Campus that Provides an Adaptable Environment that Allows Planning and Experimentation

• If students could have a special zone on campus were an abundance and immediate access to tools for diagramming and mapping out future plans, students could greatly strengthen their powers of visual observation and display in a form that could also relay back to others who are intrigued by what they see in the ideas. This will also emphasize the importance of scaling products or ideas into the right size category and seeing design flaws first hand before the flaw becomes an implication on a potentially revolutionary new innovation. Structural analysis will also result from seeing an idea transformed into a 3D model as if it actually exists already as a prototype.

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Progressive Milestones

• Identify settings ideal for this hub - May 2015
• Identify the surroundings that could fuel it - October 2015
• Estimate the amount of time and resources needed to construct it - January 2016
• Get peer opinion and appeal - February 2016
• Invest or acquire the necessary items - May 2016
• Complete the construction of this “visual idea center” - 2017

Strategy #3: Changing Course Curriculum

Team Leader: Bart Grabowski

Objective: At Illinois Institute of Technology we are blessed to have courses that provide hands-on “learning by doing” experiences such as the Interprofessional Projects or IPRO course. However, IPRO courses are primarily reserved for junior and senior level students who have a couple years of knowledge within their respective majors(s). The goal is to implement more entrepreneurial courses in all majors here at IIT to allow a greater balance among course schedules in order for students to benefit after their studies.

Tactic #1: Introduction of Entrepreneurship in first year courses

• Students at IIT should be exposed to the ideas, principles, and other relevant works that fall under entrepreneurship and design thinking. In a student’s first year, IIT would provide a general course for all majors on what is entrepreneurship and how can it be applicable to your studies. Right off the bat, students will know guidelines to entrepreneurship and can benefit them in determining whether or not exploring entrepreneurship is the right path to go. Testing the waters, so to speak.

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​ Progressive Milestones

• Investigation of target points of impact- completed with an enthusiastic and relevant faculty member along with interested peers - March 2015
• Identification of target audience - completed with the opinion of peers and acknowledgement of common appeal - March 2015
• Feedback from target audience - April 2015
• Project preparation - September 2015
• Implementation onto university campus - 2016-2017

Tactic #2: Required innovation/design thinking/ entrepreneurial course(s) in all majors

• Currently, IIT has implemented entrepreneurial courses in Engineering Management and of course Business. Students of all majors are allowed to take courses at the Stuart School of Business, but only count as elective courses. Essentially, IIT would implement courses that are innovation/entrepreneurial specific in the major that the student is studying. Courses would be structured from a learning-by doing basis and instructors would act as guidance for students. One important target point is that each department will structure such courses based upon the principles of the major and how entrepreneurship should be applied.

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​ Progressive Milestones

• Investigation of target points of impact- completed with an enthusiastic and relevant faculty member along with interested peers - April 2015
• Identification of target audience - completed with the opinion of peers and acknowledgement of common appeal - May 2015
• Feedback from target audience - June 2015
• Project preparation - November 2015
• Implementation onto university campus - 2016-2017 (subject to change)

Tactic #3: Giving credit where credit is due

• Illinois Institute of Technology should encourage students to become more entrepreneurial driven for them be able to create the next successful product, service, and or idea. One way IIT could do this is apply school credit to entrepreneurial ventures. Students would receive additional credit for their projects and would allow for a greater balance among student schedules. Students would be able to manage their time more wisely because their ‘ventures’ would be recognized by the university and would be credited to their degree.

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Progressive Milestones

• Investigation of target points of impact- completed with an enthusiastic and relevant faculty member along with interested peers - April 2015
• Identification of target audience - completed with the opinion of peers and acknowledgement of common appeal - March 2015
• Feedback from target audience - April 2015
• Project preparation - December 2015
• Implementation onto university campus - 2016-2017, 2017-2018