School:Santa Clara University

Santa Clara University

Promoting Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Santa Clara University has many institutions perfect for growing its students' entrepreneurial skills.  A popular minor at the school is entrepreneurship, where students take classes in many different business disciplines.  This minor also includes an internship with a start up in Silicon Valley. Similarly, the school offers a minor in Technical Innovation, Design Thinking and the Entrepreneurial Mindset, which is held within the School of Engineering with the purpose of being easier to fit in to an engineer's schedule than the entrepreneurship minor. The school also offers opportunities for project-based design thinking experience through clubs such as Bronco Design, ASME, IEEE, CIE and more. The SCU School of Engineering offers many elective courses in design thinking and innovation as a part of the KEEN program, which looks to encourage innovation on campus. The KEEN program also sponsors quarterly project-based competitions with cash prizes to incentivize students to gain valuable experience. Santa Clara is currently in the process of implementing STEM 2020, a project which involves replacing all the current STEM buildings with a massive STEM complex called the Sobroato Campus for Discovery and Innovation (SCDI). SCU is designing this complex with the intention of having innovation and entrepreneurship at the forefront.

Encouraging Faculty Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Being in the Silicon Valley, a lot of the professors here at Santa Clara come from entrepreneurial professions.  Many teachers in the business school teach with the entrepreneurial mindset and give real world examples from their own experiences.  Often, faculty also have important relationships with start up companies and encourage these companies to come speak on campus.  Professors also get many grants that they hand off to students to encourage entrepreneurship.  Every senior engineering student must create their own design product, working along side faculty, considering many entrepreneurial ideals. Finally, Santa Clara hires real-world entrepenuers and industry leaders to teach 1-unit elective classes.

Actively Supporting the University Technology Transfer Function

The Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship facilitates the transfer of technology to students and runs various programs to bring speakers on campus all in the name of entrepreneurship.  The center provides a network of connections to various companies and technologies so the students can flourish with the entrepreneurial mindset.  The use of technology is also encouraged in the Maker Lab at Santa Clara University, where any student who goes through training can use the lab as much as they wish and create anything they want there. Furthermore, through the construction of the Sobrato Campus for Discovery and Innovaiton (the new space for STEM at SCU), the school is investing in "Innovation Spaces" throughout the new buildings where students can collaborate on projects, as well as Maker Spaces similar to the Maker Lab to allow for hands on learning.

Facilitating University-Industry Collaboration

The university has many useful connections with companies inside and outside of Silicon Valley.  Handshake is a website where students can see job and internship postings for companies looking for Santa Clara University students.  There are many startups and entrepreneurial opportunities available for students here, such as the quartily KEEN competitions.

Engaging with Regional and Local Economic Development Efforts  

Santa Clara encourages students to aid in regional and local economic efforts. An example of this is the collaboration with NASA and the SCU Robotics Systems Lab, where students run missions with cutely named satellites "Ketchup and Mustard". The school also encourages its students to be socially responsible in all things including promoting charitable programs in dorms, and even requiring an (experiential learning and social justice) core curriculum requirement which gets students out volunteering in the community.  All in all, Santa Clara takes advantage of the surrouding area in a way that is beneficial to its students.

Landscape Canvas  

LINK to our Landscape Canvas assessment which breaks down and highlights the courses, programs, and organizations that promote Innovation and Entrepreneurship on our campus.

Related Links

Santa Clara University

Santa Clara University Student Priorities

University Innovation Fellow:

Payton Bradsky, Ruby Karimjee, Ryan Lund, Anthony Fenzl

Taylor Mau Mariah Manzano Connor Tisch Michael Mehta

Laura Tschudy, Andrew Torrance, Rory Pannkuk, Will Mcmullen, Matt Belford, Melody Yang