|
|
|
Saying YES to Entrepreneurship
Yale confab highlights students' budding businesses
|
Business New Haven
4/29/2002
By: E.A. Linden
|
Over the weekend of April 19-20, the Yale Entrepreneurial Society (YES), hosted its first annual “Innovation Summit” bringing together authorities on bio- and nanotechnologies, artificial intelligence, social and global entrepreneurship.
Attendees from 21 states and four countries took part in panel discussions, lectures and networking receptions.
The panels covered a variety of topics ranging from “Innovations in Education: What Can Be Done To Prepare Today's Children for Tomorrow's Challenges?” to “Artificial Intelligence: Research & Commercialization.” Speakers hailed from a variety of disciplines, from educators and activists to entrepreneurs, politicians and writers.
The education panel speakers varied in educational approach and included Christina Giammalva, a grass-roots organizer and teacher in East Harlem where she co-founded the Family Academy, and Aaron Lieberman, founder of JumpStart and a national leader in the entrepreneurial approach to education.
YES was founded in 1999 by two Yale undergraduates to foster diverse discussion and response to entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial possibilities. Today, YES is the largest student-run organization on campus, sponsoring lectures and events year-round.
YES is best known for its Y50K Entrepreneurship Competition, which finances six winning business plans (three for for-profit businesses, three in the non-profit sector). One winner chosen in each of the two categories receives $12,500, while the four runners-up each receive $6,250. Additionally, Y50K winners receive support services that enable the new businesses to make the most of the opportunity the prize money affords.
Competition this year was diverse with the for-profit category attracting proposals ranging from medical alert devices to foreign language programs for children. The social-entrepreneurship category also hosted a broad spectrum of services from a post-cancer treatment program to a company promoting fair trade in coffee to the U.S.
Sensory Media, a software company that entered a program that allows people to try on eyeglass frames virtually, won in the for-profit category. The Juvenile Rights Advocacy Project took first place for social entrepreneurship.
The Juvenile Rights Advocacy Project (JRAP) was born out of a need to reduce tension between New Haven youth and city police officers. A group comprising mainly law students began two years ago to address the situation by taking curriculum into local schools, teaching students about their “rights and responsibilities with the police,” explains Laura McCargar, a Yale senior and the only undergrad in the organization. The program was well received and eventually the curriculum evolved to include a movie.
“We worked in cooperation with the New Haven police to make a 20-minute video using real officers, students and neighborhoods in the area,” explains McCargar. “We then took it to the schools and trained a group of peer educators who now teach the curriculum to other students with a student from the law school.”
YES places special emphasis on its mission to encourage social entrepreneurship such as the JRAP, supporting the efforts of ventures that stress social responsibility over profit motives. Amy Jain, YES' vice president of public relations and a Yale sophomore, reports that all interested students in Yale University are encouraged to apply to Y50K. “The business plan competition is in its third year and we have seen a phenomenal increase in the quality of the plans,” she says. “This year there are some very strong Yale-led ventures.”
Last year's winners were MEMStar, a for-profit company using micro-electrical-mechanical systems technology in tracking devices, and Elmseed, an innovative micro-lender serving the credit needs of the New Haven community.
By all appearances, the YES forum was a success, with entrepreneurs sharing their ideas about how to achieve social and personal success. As Jain describes it, YES's biggest goal was achieved over the course of the forum as students and businessmen alike see diverse examples of what entrepreneurship can be.
“We are trying to foster a new mentality at Yale,” she explains. “We want to teach people about the option of entrepreneurship.” The YES program, so far, seems to have done just that.
|
Go FirstGo PreviousGo
NextGo LastGo
to Index
|
|
