The UMass Integrated Concentration in Science Program (iCons) and the Isenberg School of Management have received funding from VentureWell to boost innovation output from UMass Amherst students. The team, led by Scott Auerbach, Mahoney Family Executive Director and professor of chemistry, and Mila Getmansky Sherman, Judith Wilkinson O’Connell Faculty Fellow and professor of finance, will develop a new case-study curriculum for iCons that links business and STEM principles.
Auerbach said, “This interdisciplinary education, bridging fields like STEM and business for the sake of triggering innovation, supports diversity, equity, and inclusion in entrepreneurship.”
The team will build on iCons’ mission of inspiring a diverse generation of innovators to develop solutions for societal problems. A focus on unique, student-driven innovation is a critical component of the student entrepreneurial team. Successful e-teams are already emerging from iCons, with one team currently working on a new invention in the healthcare space. iCons looks to continue the trajectory of launching innovative and diverse projects into the public and private spheres with the assistance of VentureWell.
To ensure this potential is fully realized, iCons adopted a “trigger and sustain” strategy for boosting entrepreneurship by adding these two critical ingredients to iCons:
- Developing inspiring case studies that highlight student-driven product development and revealing links among principles of STEM and business.
- Sustaining innovation by providing funding to iCons e-teams for product development and prototyping research through a proposal process.
“We are excited about an opportunity for both iCons and Isenberg to work together,” said Getmansky Sherman. “Gathering more synergistic ideas and opportunities to grow together, while utilizing tools within iCons and Isenberg, is an exciting launching point for business students to integrate with STEM and iCons, and vice versa.”
A seven-step plan, beginning with team recruitment and ending with disseminating a revised curriculum, will be measured by successful implementation of the said curriculum resulting in, to name a few quantitative metrics, an increased number of business students applying to and completing iCons, an increase in E-team generation, and examples of utilization in case studies away from UMass.
“There are clear concepts within both fields that overlap each other,” Scott Auerbach detailed. “Stocks and bonds are quite similar to gene pools: diversity is key. This project is a creation of culture between business and STEM; not one of division, but one of unity.”
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