Priorities:The Ohio State University Student Priorities

Overview

The Ohio State University offers premier services to pockets of students through organizations such as the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Technology Commercialization Office, and various student organization. However, these are not widely utilized within engineering and business, let alone the rest of the university. The typical student receives little to no of the entrepreneurial and innovation education that prepares them for the modern economy. To extend the long-term I&E Ecosystem at Ohio State; to provide students with resources and environments that facilitate innovation learning; to advise, incubate, and accelerate student generated ideas, the following Student Priorities have been created.

[UIF Initiatives for Ohio State Campus]

Priority 1: Formalizing the Innovation Fellows Program

The first area of focus is to formalize the UIF program at Ohio State. The University had one previous fellow in 2014, Peeyush Shrivastava. However, since then, the program has not garnered continued support. Therefore, in order to ensure continued success, our first priority is to work with faculty and administrators to ensure the university will have a leadership circle per year. 

• Fellows involved: Liyang Feng, Juan Tramontin, George Valcarcel, Kai Vogeler

Milestone 1: Conduct Stakeholder meetings - February 15th, 2018

• Description: On Feburary 15th, the leadership circle will meet with faculty and administrators in order to enducate them about the UIF program and summarize the leadership team's mission and priorities. 

Milestone 2: Define Affiliation with Ohio State University - March, 2018

• Description: The UIF program is primarily student driven. However, it is innately dependent on the university for funding and support. Therefore it is imperative to define how future leadership circles will be chosen and how they will interact with stakeholders. 

Milestone 3: Create Application Process for Spring 2019 Fellow Candidates - May, 2018

• Description: In order to ensure student from any major are able to be part of this program, Ohio State will have a competative application process where a students are chosen to apply to the fellows program. The existing leadership circle and stakeholders will determine an application and evaluation process. 

Milestone 4: Advertise Program and Collect Applications - Summer/Early Fall, 2018

• Description: Through a variety of streams yet to be determined, the Fellows program will be advertised to the student body. 

Milestone 5: Select Leadership Circle assist them application process - Septemer, 2018

• Description: A new leadership circle will be selected to apply to the UIF program. With the help of current fellows and stakeholders the new circle will complete the application to the fellows program.</<strike></<strike>

Strategy #2: Incorporating Novel Learning Methods Into Curriculum Design

The underlying theme by which this strategy is formed is the fact that there is an increased need for student creativity and innovation in the workplace and in the global market. Appropriately, this has resulted in phenomena like reverse innovation, in which cost effective and functional tools are created for applications in third world countries, and subsequently gain traction in more developed markets as cost saving alternatives. As such, the tactics employed below seek to create immersive entrepreneurial courses where processes 

Following are an array of strategies over a 2-3 year period:

Tactic #1: Student Led Discussion and Immersion

• Description: Mark Twain once said that "I never let my schooling interfere with my education". His purpose here was not to denounce the value of education, but rather to explicate upon the fact that conventional education methods do not effectively promote creativity in and out of the classroom. They do not engage students to the point where individuals feel the passion or desire to be mission driven, and work towards an end goal that they design for themself. The goal of this tactic is to ensure that experimentally successful techniques, such as the Harkness Learning Method, be introduced into course which are inherently meant to teach immersive cocnepts like managerial economics, entrepreneurship, business plan development, but also courses likes Global Public Health, Medical Device Commercialization and more. 

• Team Leaders: Peeyush Shrivastava, Dr. Michael Camp, PhD (Fisher College of Business), Dr. Amy Acton, MD, MPH (College of Public Health). Dr. Balakrishna Hardias, PhD (Director of Device Commercialization at University of Cincinnati)

• Milestones:
  • Identify courses that would be able to incorporate Harkness learning methods (See list from above). Compile a list of the faculty involved with these courses. Schedule: End of October 2014
  • Meet with these faculty members and discuss and inform about Harkness method, and create experimental plans to incorporate Harkness into some of the curriculum, based off of existent Harkness frameworks. Schedule: December 2014
  • Attempt to include Harkness style lessons to test the waters for the success of the program. Model this Harkness method by creating problems, and simply allowing the lecturer to facilitate as opposed to teach how to solve. Class size should be small, and each individual should be assessed for responsiveness. Schedule: February 2015 (Spring Semester)
  • Use data and anecdotal successes from small scale implementation to validate the model of large scale Harkness method usage. Attempt to create courses as a part of a series on I&E. Schedule: June 2015

Tactic #2: Mentor Driven Experiences

• Description: Having laboratory classes incorporated into lecture classes is meant to provide students with hands on experience, but do to the very nature of the lab courses in the first few years of an undergrad's life, the passion and drive underlying an individual's creative process can be significantly hindered. Therefore, it is reccomended that immersive experiences be tailored for students who show their passion for problem solving. Mission driven students and entrepreneurs should be paired with researchers, advisors, mentors and other industry veterans involved on/near campus as part of an initiative to grow 

• Team Leaders: Peeyush Shrivastava, Dr. Michael Camp, PhD (Fisher College of Business), Krystal Geyer, 

• Milestones:
  • Comprehensive list of mentors/advisors who have the ability to provide immersive experience for students (individuals involved with the large Makerspace in Columbus Downtown, TCO, Tech Columbus, BioOhio startup companies with funding and more. Schedule: January 2015
  • Identify a small, targeted student population with the drive to commit to an immersive experience, and use this to validate the model for a much larger integration. Schedule: Janurary 2015 (Concurrent with above) 
  • Attempt to use this methodolgy for undergrads exploring research. Schedule: TBD

Strategy #3: Accelerated Programs to Encourage Translational Problem Solving

Some innovative research universities like RPI have formed accelerated BS-PhD Programs so as to promote an interdiciplinary set of problem solving skills very early on for their students. This is an initiative that would be incredibly effective at an institution as large as Ohio State, especially if it were tailored to a small program, much like the Biomedical Science Undergraduate Program. This program has a major emphasis on research, and is limited to 25 students per year, enabling longitudinal analysis to be quite pragmatic. An accelerated BS-PhD degree could potentially increase the quantity and quality of innovation being developed by students by providing highly motivated students with the resources, framework, and peer ecosystem necessary to pursue their innovations via research and immersive learning. 

Tactic #1: Accelerated BS-PhD Program incorporated into Undergraduate Biomedical Science

• Description: The prupose of this tactic is to develop a highly strategic relationship between the Undergraduate Biomedical Science Major and the Integrated Biomedical Graduate Program (IBGP) so as to faciliate a means of encouraging student innovation via research and problem solving as early as a student's first year of college. 

• Team Leaders: Peeyush Shrivastava, Dr. Michael Camp, PhD (Fisher College of Business).

• Milestones:
  • Speak to Steven Mousetes and Dr. John Gunn from Undergraduate Biomedical Science Program, and arrange a meeting with the directors of the IBGP. Schedule: Novemeber 2014
  • Identify universities which have adopted such an accelerated program, and identify the successes and tangible impacts on I&E as well as the generic progress of the university in preparation for a series of meetings to address potential adoption. Schedule: December 2014
  • Meet with the decision makers on this front. Schedule: TBD

Tactic #2: Accelerated BS-MS Program for Ohio State University

• Description: Similar to Tactic 1, this would be a method of attaining broader appeal for the university's emphasis on research innovation by creating a generic accelerated BS-MS Program for Ohio State. This would have the same impact as the above tactic, but would involve several different approvals from several different colleges. Dr. Drake seems supportive of this kind of path as it is resemblant of a 21st century emphasis on interdisciplinary team skills. 

• Team Leaders: Peeyush Shrivastava, Dr. Michael Camp, PhD (Fisher College of Business).

• Milestones:
  • Speak to Steven Mousetes and Dr. John Gunn from Undergraduate Biomedical Science Program, and arrange a meeting with the directors of the IBGP. Schedule: Novemeber 2014
  • Identify universities which have adopted such an accelerated program, and identify the successes and tangible impacts on I&E as well as the generic progress of the university in preparation for a series of meetings to address potential adoption. Schedule: December 2014
  • Meet with the decision makers on this front. Schedule: TBD

Related Links

The Ohio State University

Peeyush Shrivastava