Priorities:University of California Riverside Student Priorities
Contents
Project Pitch Video
Fall 2016
Strategy #1: Provide More Experiential Learning Opportunities
Tactic 1 - Cross Campus Entrepreneurs' aCCElerator Program
The Cross Campus Entrepreneurs student organization on campus is initiating a 9-month long accelerator program to encourage and grow the students innovative and entrepreneurial spirit. The program is organized to correspond to the three quarters during the academic year. The fall quarter is focused on getting students involved and growing their network. During this quarter students learn how to form a team and create and iterate on an idea. This is also used to break the students out of the mindset that they can't be creative and innovative at the university. Once they have formed a team and come to a project idea, the winter quarter is spent creating a prototype and performing customer discover. This is the "get out of the building" portion of the program which encourages students to get into the community and talk to their potential customers and end users and discover what they desire from a project. The final quarter is spend developing their idea and prototype into a full fledged company by developing a busines model canvas. At the end of the nine months (academic year) the teams will participate in a pitch competition to showcase what they have learned.
Tactic 2 - The Creat'R Lab
The development of the Creat'R Lab which is slated for Winter 2017 aims to provide students a space for innovation by providing resources from craft supplies to heavy machinery.The maker space will encompass several rooms in the Orbach Science Library on campus and will be available to the entire student body. The UC Riverside Innovation Fellows along with several student and administrative organizations have been participating in an ongoing dialogue to ensure that the Creat'R Lab meets the expectations of all parties. By implementing this unique experiential learning opportunity on UCR's campus, our team will be in an advantageous position to market it effectively.
Strategy #2: Increase Student Awareness of Campus I&E
One of the primary gaps in the innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem at UC Riverside is the lack of awareness and entrepreneurial attitude on campus. To address this gap, the university innovation fellows are going to be creating an "Ideation Station" which is a portable tent with whiteboards on three of the sides to promote creativity and innovation on campus while students are passing between classes. This station will make a game out of developing an idea into a project, product, or even company so the students will have fun and become more aware of their options.
Strategy #3: Enhance Interdepartmental Communication and Collaboration
UC Riverside is a large campus with twenty thousand students but, they are spread across four separate colleges without much interdepartmental communication. This leads to a silo effect which discourages sharing of resources and collaboration. The goal here is to encourage interdisciplinary teams and courses to break down the silos, while simultaneously working to break down a strict "teacher-student" relationship and fostering a collaborative learning environment, giving part of the control of the students education back into the hands of the students. Towards this end we have already iniatied conversations with faculty in several departments to encourage the development of new courses that will be cross listed with multiple colleges and be able to fulfill major requirements for all of them. UC Riverside is in a stage of high growth at the moment, which also leads to the hiring of younger faculty which are generally more accepting of a newer education style.
Related Links
University of California, Riverside
Campus Innovation Fellows
Fall 2016:
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