Welcome to the brand new home of the University Innovation Fellows Program!

*** NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR FALL TRAINING: We are searching for 27 University Innovation Fellows to join current team of 33. Deadline for Fall Training is September 16th. APPLY NOW. ***

Welcome to the brand new home of the University Innovation Fellows Program! So much has changed, where to we begin? Let’s start from the top:

• First, the name University Innovation Fellows (UI Fellow) refers to the students who we train and groom to lead the movement on their campuses. This retires the name that gave us our start back in 2010, the Student Ambassadors Program… no offense to all you other Student Ambassadors out there, there are just way too many of you representing anything from software to consumer products. We wanted a name that conveyed the leadership qualities our students embody and conveys the prestige that comes with it. The new name also says a little bit more about what they do, which is to work to enhance the innovation ecosystem on campus. Learn more.
• We are excited to announce that our application for Fall Training is now live! We are seeking 27 bright new students to join our team of 33 to bring us to 60 University Innovation Fellows for the 2013-2014 academic year. Learn more about the advantages of becoming a UI Fellow and of having one on your campus here.
• Next, the new website address dreamdesigndeliver.org … University Innovation Fellows are inspiring students to ‘Dream. Design. Deliver.’ new solutions to the world around them. This is a call for engineers and their interdisciplinary peers to think creatively, invent and adopt an entrepreneurial mindset. So, if your campus is selected to have a University Innovation Fellow, you’ll likely see cool-looking students sporting fabulous T-shirts that urge students on campus to ‘Dream. Design. Deliver.’ along with them in a movement that will sweep their campus and the nation.
• Finally, you’ll notice a lot of great new content written by University Innovation Fellows. These from-the-trenches perspectives on catalyzing student innovation on campus, tools and resources that hone the entrepreneurial mindset and examples of institutional change. This is the place you’ll learn how the actions of two students and their team helped land $20 million to fund a design institute. You’ll hear one University Innovation Fellow strategy of creating something every day to hone his creativity skills. And occasionally other contributors, from staff to students at large, will share lists of seed funding sources or free online courses that strengthen your innovation skills. You’ll want to make sure you follow this blog by email so you don’t miss anything. Just follow the link on our home page and make it so.

We’re really excited about some important enhancements to the University Innovation Fellows program and the plans in place for the year ahead! You’ll see a lot more coming from us in the next few months. We want this movement to bring together campus changemakers. Innovation and the entrepreneurial mindset are the way forward for us personally and as a nation and it will take ALL OF US pulling in the same direction to make it happen. Join us, either as a University Innovation Fellow or join us as a collaborator. We would love make students aware of the opportunities, resources and tools you offer to help strengthen the campus ecosystem. Join us!

You can contact me at humera at nciia dot org or post your comments below!

~ Humera Fasihuddin, @ihumera

Senior Program Officer, University Innovation Fellows.

*** NOW ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR FALL TRAINING: We are searching for 27 University Innovation Fellows to join current team of 33. Deadline for Fall Training is September 16th. APPLY NOW. ***