Dr. Anita Bleffert-Schmidt from SUNY-Ulster talks about the advantages of experiential or action learning. One of the big ones is that it spurs community action and brings businesses closer to your institution.

For students themselves, this Chinese proverb sums it up: I hear, I forget; I see, I remember; I do, I understand.

Mindy Kole, of SUNY-Ulster, described a student-run business they’re starting called Community Creations. This will be a kiosk in the cafeteria featuring products from local artisans. Embedded it in the entrepreneurship curriculum; every student that comes through the e-ship track will work on the business. It’s 40% of their grade in the e-ship course.

(At first they tried running the kiosk as a club but it was hard to get people to show up; this mirrors the experience of another college that spoke at one of the pre-conference events yesterday.)

They are in the third term of students who worked on this. First term, the students did research on campus as to what the student-run business should be. They developed a survey and got 230 surveys back. Based on that information, they wrote a business plan.

Last fall, they received a Colman Grant for the start-up costs. So in the spring the students started working in teams and each team functioned as a department. There was a kiosk team, who needed to go out and find a builder. Another team worked on the website. One team worked with local entrepreneurs on how they would get products into the kiosk. Other teams worked on accounting and marketing.

They received tremendous campus support, which was critical. For example, an accounting professor worked with the team, training them in QuickBooks. Security worked with them on developing policies to help ensure policies about how the cash is handled on campus. College attorneys reviewed the consignment agreement. The cafeteria donated a cash register and gave them space for the kiosk. Consider the culture of your institution to understand whether this type of support will be possible to achieve.

The business is run as a consignment business; 60% of proceeds of a sale go to the artisan and 40% go back to support the business.

Make sure you don't step on the toes of other campus businesses, like the cafeteria or the book store.

A key success factor is bringing in the community. In this case, the students found the artisans and worked with them on pricing, etc.

For more info on the project Mindy talked about, check Facebook.com/Pfeiffer Center or @mkole on Twitter.

Second Example

James Matlack described KCKCC Made, a student run business at Kansas City Kansas Community College. This is structured very differently from the previously described business.

What they were finding in everything noncredit re: entrepreneurship, they weren’t getting students involved. So they did some research including surveys and did a SWOT analysis. Narrowed the reasons down to five reasons why students weren’t attending:

What is in it for me? Average is early 30s, leading busy lives, need to let them know why this is of value to them.

$$ - need to do something that generates from income for students.

"Hide” the education – wanted to create a program in which people learned without knowing they were being educated.

Confidence – all in it together – found students were intimidated by consulting sessions, so needed to get them some confidence.

Exposure – professors said there were a lot of great ideas among the students but they weren’t getting exposure.

So they launched KCKCC Made, which sells products made by students, faculty or staff at the KCKCC bookstore. Also includes marketing support and business consulting. People are required to do two consulting sessions with the SBDC in order to sell in the business. So they see a benefit to the sessions and they love it. They also have to  demonstrate that they have some sort of business plan in process.

At first the bookstore was reluctant, but the students met with them and convinced them that it would help draw traffic to the store so they got on board.

This model is based on supporting the entrepreneur and getting their business off the ground and helping them be successful. But then the students are running the business. The students aren’t there actually doing the selling; the products are in a defined section of the bookstore but the bookstore takes care of the retail portion of it and tracks sales. The students did things like writing the consignment agreement, etc. The participation of students is extra curricular, not credit. Students in Free Enterprise run it.

One product sold is a barbeque sauce that is sold in 10 states; on the other side is a student who makes jewelry between classes. So they have people with different intentions as far as growing a business. Currently have 15 entrepreneurs, 12 of which are students. They are launching an online portion. They’re also working on an idea for selling services.For services, they decided they would require that the student or faculty member would have to own 25% of the parent business in order to qualify.

For more information, James’ Twitter account is  @WFD–KCK.

Just back from the opening reception, where conversations were humming and filling the room with the special excitement that is unique to NACCE conference.  First person I ran into was Dan Larson, the outgoing NACCE board chair who is also president of Cayuga Community College in New York.

We talked about what makes the NACCE conference different from other educational conferences and Dan summed it up with this thought: "The people in this room know they make a difference in people’s lives.”

Next I talked with Ron Liss, who is the new president of a campus of Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland, OH.  Ron moved there in July from Santa Fe, where he participated in the Virtual Incubation project that NACCE was a part of. I asked him why he came back to the NACCE Conference in his new role as president and he said, "I came because we’re trying to expand the penetration of our entrepreneurial efforts, at least that’s my goal. I’d like to see our entrepreneurial effort spread and to perhaps even start up virtual incubation.”

Next I ran into Jim Elias of Muscatane Community College in Iowa. We met last year when he attended his first NACCE event shortly after having been given a mandate to start an entrepreneurship center. "Last year was fantastic for me,” he said. "I learned all sorts of great stuff at a time when we were just diving into entrepreneurship. Since then we have launched the entrepreneurship center; the new furniture was delivered on Wednesday!”

Coming to the conference this year is Bob Allbee, president of Muscatane Community College; they made a presentation for a NACCE Entrepreneurship College in Action grant. They were the last presenters of the day and Jim didn’t arrive at the hotel until two minutes before they were to present! Bob says he wasn’t worried at all…somehow I doubt that! About his first foray into a NACCE Conference, Bob said, "I’m enjoying it; listen to the noise in this room; it’s exciting.”

Indeed it is! Tune in tomorrow for some more NACCE Conference news and impressions.  

Just sat in on some of the preliminary live presentations for the NACCE Entrepreneurial College in Action Grants, powered by the Coleman Foundation. The focus this year is on programs that promote the first two steps of the Presidents for Entrepreneurship Pledge. Grants of up to $15,000 will go to colleges that create and expand internal and external teams dedicated to entrepreneurship or increase entrepreneurs’ engagement on campus.

From the three presentations I watched, the judges have their work cut out for them. South Mountain Community College in Phoenix, AZ; Ivy Tech in Fort Wayne, IN, and Houston Community College – Northwest, in Houston, TX, all made compelling presentations while I sat in. I’m sure the other finalists are going a similar good job this afternoon. Winners will be announced at breakfast on Wednesday. Good luck to all!

Just went to the conference registration desk to sign in and saw that the place was alive with activity. The staff told me it’s been non-stop action since they opened at 8:30 this morning. And everywhere I’ve gone in the hotel (which is quite nice, by the way) I’ve bumped into NACCE folks.

Had breakfast beside folks from Eastern West Virginia Community & Technical College, in Moorefield, WV. They’re a finalist  in the NACCE  Entrepreneurial College in Action Grant competition, funded by the Coleman Foundation. They apparently are first up among the presenters this afternoon and were doing some fine-tuning of their presentation. They seemed pretty cool about it, but the opportunity to win up to $15,000 for your entrepreneurial program would give anyone sweaty palms, I’d think.

It’s great to start running into people I’ve met at past NACCE Conferences, like Jackie Peterson from Portland Community College in Portland, OR, and Ed Massey from Indian River State College in FL. Makes the place feel like home!