As STEM technicians are increasingly involved in multidisciplinary projects, team work, communications, interpersonal and business skills become crucial to successful employment. The Institute for Virtual Enterprise proposes to plan for a Center for Technological Entrepreneurship that provides the means to infuse entrepreneurship in technical courses. The Center develops, maintains and disseminates modular curricular materials based on successful practices at community colleges such as problem- and scenario- based learning and including those developed and tested in the Virtual Enterprise Institute. Students using these materials, particularly those from populations underrepresented in STEM technician fields and students from rural areas, are networked through a series of virtual activities. The modular materials are disseminated through a network of faculty demonstration sites mentored by the Center. The planning process includes two workshops with advisory partners from industry and academia that are to determine the state of entrepreneurial STEM education at community colleges and to investigate the need for and design of entrepreneurship student networks. The planning process also produces a catalog of the skills required by STEM entrepreneurs and validates the approach of developing modular materials to infuse these skills into existing STEM courses through the development of faculty demonstration sites.
This grant funded the research and planning process for an ATE Regional Center, the Center for Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship (TIE). After numerous focus groups, discussions with experts at conferences, and input from faculty members, a plan was agreed upon and submitted to NSF in October of 2012. Below is a summary of the plan that is the result of this work. The primary mission of TIE is to build a community of practice around Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship Education. TIE will recruit community college STEM faculty members to integrate the spectrum of practice (TIE Educational Spectrum) into their classrooms, incubate research on these practices, and support the faculty and their students with entrepreneurship events, peer networking, guides and a content home. The TIE Educational Spectrum comprises: Awareness – Entrepreneurship and related concepts/approaches are introduced through case studies and problem based learning (PBL). Simulation – STEM business and entrepreneurial activities are practiced in the classroom through Virtual Enterprise or serious games. Incubation – Student are able to launch and operate entrepreneurial enterprises through, virtual incubation networks (such as CUNY’s SmartPitch), on-campus business incubation facilities, and Contract Research Organizations (CROs). The Center will serve the students and faculty members of STEM programs at community colleges and will support the operations of other ATE Centers. TIE’s services will support three main objectives: Objective 1 – Facilitate an Action Research and Dissemination Hub: Support "action research" across the TIE Educational Spectrum for the study and infusion of best practices into classrooms: Mentored action research – 80 community college faculty members will be mentored by Baruch entrepreneurship faculty and receive small stipends to design and conduct action research studies that investigate the impact of TIE activities on attitudes, skills and competencies. Dissemination of research findings – faculty research will be presented at a national conference on technological innovation and entrepreneurship offered in conjunction with the National Association for Community College Entrepreneurship (NACCE). Selected faculty will publish their research findings in peer reviewed research journals. Effectiveness research – TIE will advance the practice of action research by studying how the process impacts entrepreneurship education on partner campuses. Objective 2 – Provide a "community home" for STEM Entrepreneurship Education and Research – the TIE Commons web-portal: Action research database – The research findings (objectives 1b,c) will be published in TIE’s ERIC-style online database of action research articles contributed by implementers. Collaborative wiki – A wiki will allow stakeholders (TIE Center faculty, implementers and industry partners) to share guides and best practices on the TIE Educational Spectrum (building upon DUE-0802365 and 1104183). Videos will be shared that promote STEM entrepreneurship as a viable career option, and provide model classroom activities (funded under DUE-1205031). Social network – A social network will be established so that students can find like-minded peers (future business partners) and faculty members can interact across campuses with their peers at different stages of integrating TIE experiences. Objective 3 – Operate the TIE Education Network of Community College STEM Faculty and Students: A network of community colleges that engage in technological innovation and entrepreneurship experiences will be established. The network will facilitate the following activities: Student events – Online presentation days and simulated trade fairs for student STEM businesses, and the online student STEM business incubation competition called SmartPitch. Online speaker series – Experts from Baruch’s Field Center and other sites will provide distance lectures and act as business reviewers and judges. Demonstration site visits – Campuses with the leading successful programs will host faculty visits and provide mentorship for other community colleges seeking to add similar programs.
