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Illinois Institute of Technology is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It is a tech school with 3000+ undergraduate and 4000+ graduate students. Illinois Tech has over 130 majors but mostly focus on STEM subjects, specifically engineering and computer science. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity"

When an entrepreneur has an innovative idea in mind and is in search of nearby resources to help them take their entrepreneurial passions to the next level, they need to seek out relative programs, organizations, and sponsors to help them kick start their goals. Illinois Institute of Technology provides many open opportunities for students to collaborate with students of all disciplines and connect ideas related to entrepreneurship and eventually launch them into action. Students can even enroll in foundation courses embracing the aspects of entrepreneurship and potentially pursue it in a graduate program.

The Ed Kaplan Family Institute for Entrepreneurship and Tech Innovation is the newest Institute on Mies Campus. It will attract innovative and entrepreneurial students from across the campus (and beyond) who will come to learn how to convert their creative ideas into significant and viable businesses, services, and new solutions. They will become the leaders, inventors, and entrepreneurs of the future discovering, addressing, and solving serious and consequential problems. New faculty, donors, sponsors, and other business and industry partners will also be attracted to the new initiative and the abundant opportunities which it will provide for all.

The Kaplan Institute will nurture the advancement of critical and creative ideas, foster interdisciplinary and external collaboration, and create a culture that enables innovation and tech entrepreneurship to flourish on campus and throughout the larger community as well. In addition, the institute will aggressively contribute to its surroundings and to Chicago’s overall economy by encouraging, supporting, and assisting its students and faculty in creating new businesses and other entrepreneurial endeavors.

The emphasis of the educational experience within the institute (once the students have completed some of the basic introductory programs) will be on the application of knowledge rather than merely its acquisition. Additional and essential learning will, of course, occur during the entrepreneurial process along with innovative thinking as the students engage in multidisciplinary collaborations across all of the disciplines offered within the broader context of the entire university.

In fact, part of the entire purpose of the KI is to supplement the technical education of the students with critical and future-proof skills including intellectual curiosity, a commitment to change, team-building ability, an entrepreneurial mindset, a willingness to accept challenges, and a bias toward action. Special leadership programs will be developed and offered to identified cohorts of undergraduates as well as graduate students, focusing on the development critical-thinking skills, resilience and perseverance, adaptability and agility, and strategic design and planning.

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U.S. Department of Commerce Innovation Ecosystem Categories

Promoting student innovation and entrepreneurship

Illinois Tech offers many clubs and courses where students can work towards gaining a better understanding of I & E, all the while producing ideas and products to potentially launch. These programs also allow for students to practice skills important to I & E including experimentation, problem solving, and visual analysis:

IPRO
Ed Kaplan Family Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship
Innovation Day
Armour R&D expos
Student groups or events (Intinium, CEO, Undergraduate Business Council, hackathons, and others)
Over 75 courses relating to innovation/entrepreneurship
Laboratories, collaboration, prototyping and maker spaces
Incubator North and South

Encouraging faculty innovation and entrepreneurship

Illinois Tech professors are able to apply for individual grants from the NIH to be applied to their respectives labs, in order to fund ongoing research:

NIH funded grants (BME dept: Eric Brey (Diabetes REU Grant))
NIH funded Business Start-up competition
NIH funded Neurostartup Challenge
NIH funded AP study

For more info, please visit the Office of Sponsored Research Projects (they will have records of other funders such as NSF, DOD, DOE, VentureWell, Coleman Foundation, etc.) You may also visit our Corporate Relations office and the Advancement groups facilitate, as well.

Actively supporting the university technology transfer function

Illinois Tech's office of Technology Commercialization works with other institutions, organizations, visiting fellows, faculty, and government programs like the NIH to share intellectual property and/or commercialize intellectual property. The Office of Technology Commercialization also provides a path of communication stretching into industries and organizations faculty, along with making technological ideas from Illinois Tech's marketable:

Facilitating University-Industry Collaboration

Illinois Tech works with Chicago based sponsors such as the Shedd Aquarium, Adler Planetarium and the Container Store, as well as international sponsors such as Ford Motor company, General Motors, BP Amoco, Coca-Cola, Segway, and Hewlett-Packard into order to bring collaborative, real-world challenge based learning to IPRO courses. Illinois Tech also has numerous research institutions, each partnering on various research projects with outside industry.

Career Fairs
Tech Park
Student Organizations (Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers)
IPROs
Pritzker Institute of Biomedical Science and Engineering
Illinois Tech Research Institute (IITRI)
Center for Innovation and Science and Applications (CISA)
Wanger Institute for Sustainable Energy Research (WISER)
Faculty Engineering Labs
Corporate Relations Office
Partnerships with Incubators in Chicago(MHub,1871)
Corporate Relations Office

Engaging with regional and local economic development efforts

Illinois Tech's Community Affairs office partners with area businesses and regional development councils to improve the surrounding neighborhoods. Initiatives of Community Affairs and the Knapp center provide small or start up businesses with legal assistance, networking expertise, and technology training.

Illinois Tech Board of Trustees
Kaplan Institute Board of Trustees
Office of External Affairs
Institutional Advancements

Entrepreneurial Law Clinic

Corporate Relations Office

Office of Community Affairs and Outreach Programs

Academic Programs in Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Armour College of Engineering

EMGT 363—Creativity, Inventions, and Entrepreneurship for Engineers and Scientists
EMGT 406—Entrepreneurship and Intellectual Property Management
EMGT 470—Project Management
ENGR 497— Introduction to Research Methods
CHE 506—Entrepreneurship and Intellectual Property Management
ENGR 595—Product Development for Entrepreneurs

Stuart School of Business

BUS 341—Business Law for Entrepreneurs in the Modern Global Economy
BUS 361—Entrepreneurial Thinking and Practice
BUS 467—Managing Entrepreneurial Enterprise and the Global Marketplace
BUS 472—New Product Development
BUS 468—Creating and Managing the Sustainable Entrepreneurial Enterprise
MBA/EMS 529/PA 550—Social Entrepreneurship
MBA 575—Creativity and Contemporary Entrepreneurial Opportunities
MBA 576—Creating and Financing New Technology Ventures
MSF 594—Entrepreneurial Finance
ECON 151—Microeconomics
ECON 211—Principles of Economics

College of Computing

ITMM 481—Information Technology Entrepreneurship
ITMM 482—Business Innovation

Project Courses Stuart School of Business

BUS 102—Computing Tools Bus Analysis

BUS 103—Ideation: What Are My Interests?
BUS 104—Needs Analysis and Opportunity Analysis Aligned with My Interests
BUS 203—Identification and Evaluation of Prospective Consumers
BUS 204—Identification and Evaluation of Competitive Advantage
BUS 303—Financial Analysis: Pro-Forma Financial Statements
BUS 403—Developing a Strategically Business Plan
BUS 404—Selling Your Business Plan

Graduate Programs or Certifications:

Master of Business Administration, Concentration in Innovation and Emerging Enterprises
Master of Public Administration with Economic Development and Social Entrepreneurship Specialization
Master of Information Technology & Management with IT Management and Entrepreneurship Specialization
Information Technology Innovation Leadership and Entrepreneurship Certificate
Entrepreneurial Finance Certificate

Campus Entrepreneurial Efforts

The Illinois Tech Innovation Challenge:

The Illinois Tech Innovation Challenge invites students from Chicago area community colleges and high school schools to develop smart solutions for real-world consumer or business needs. This event encourages and inspires students to think about creating physical things, applications, and applications that control physical things by encouraging them to seek to solve a real-world consumer or business need or problem that they have identified. Demonstrate their creativity and inventiveness at solving this problem. This event also provides an opportunity to earn a monetary prize unto $2500 and free rent at a maker’s co-working space to recognize their accomplishment.