2020 Cohort
16
edits
Changes
Apex 90 startups
<span style="font-size:small;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color:black">Virginia Tech’s growing innovation ecosystem includes some instances of collaboration between institutes and departments at the university to promote innovation and forward-thinking collaboration among students. One example is the partnership between the </span>[http://www.icat.vt.edu/ <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; color: rgb(17, 85, 204); background-color: transparent; font-weight: 700; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology</span>] <span style="color:black">and the </span>[http://www.pamplin.vt.edu/ <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; color: rgb(17, 85, 204); background-color: transparent; font-weight: 700; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pamplin College of Business</span>]. <span style="color:black">This partnership seeks to leverage the resources ICAT is awarded as one of the research institutes at Virginia Tech (most specifically grants and well-outfitted workspaces), and pair them with undergraduate students (often coming out of the college of business, though ICAT is explicitly an interdisciplinary body) who are motivated to pursue research. In our work on the landscape canvas, we also discovered many instances of the practice and promotion of innovative thought processes in the classroom. Specifically, classes such as Leadership for Managers and Entrepreneurs and the Creative Technologies major have their students engage in excellent experiential learning experiences. However, we would say that these courses are not functioning inside of a larger initiative to teach innovation at tech, rather existing as siloed experiences at the moment. One truly holistic initiative by the university was announced in 2016 In 2016, the university laid out plans for the formation of a </span>[https://vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2016/09/da-cid.html <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; color: rgb(17, 85, 204); background-color: transparent; font-weight: 700; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Creativity and Innovation District</span>]<span style="color:black">. This will guide future thinking at the administrative level, repurpose assets, and create physical spaces to leverage creative and entrepreneurial activities and spark interdisciplinary innovation.</span></span></span>
<span style="font-size:small;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-aae9bcdf-11fc-bb87-15da-99c4b4bbdc88"><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color:black">Here at Virginia Tech, the practice and promotion of entrepreneurship is on the rise. In parts of the university, such as the College of Business and specifically the recently founded APEX center for Entrepreneurship, there is strong evidence for this. APEX hosts many events and workshops, such as the New Venture Builder workshops, which seek to connect students across disciplines to work on startups and ideas. For the 2019-2020 fiscal year, Apex has identified that there were more than 90 active startup companies founded by VirginiaTech students. However, on the other side of the spectrum, there are departments at the university that have not integrated a positive I&E culture. Classes that teach entrepreneurship are typically exclusive to business majors unless professor permission is given. Clubs such as the Entrepreneurship Club and the Innovate Living Learning community are open to anyone and everyone, but the majority of advertising and promotion for the clubs are done to business students.</span></span></span></span></span>
<span style="font-size:small;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="color:black">In summary, there are plenty of opportunities for I&E at Virginia Tech, but not many Virginia Tech students are aware of them. There is no unified ideology that I&E is beneficial to all fields. Some departments agree, and some disagree. Part of our goal is to unify the faculty and students under the idea that multidisciplinary I&E is beneficial to the growth of the school.</span></span></span>