(CLOSED) VentureWell Faculty Grants

Sponsor Name: 
VentureWell
Amount: 
$30,000
Description of the Award: 

VentureWell awards faculty grants to colleges and universities for the purpose of strengthening existing curricular programs and/or building new programs in invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Through these grant funds, VentureWell supports creative pedagogical approaches that generate student teams working on technology solutions to real-world problems, with the goal of the strongest teams applying to participate in VentureWell’s E-Team Grant Program. VentureWell has funded over 803 new courses or programs through faculty grants, and 3 out of 4 report that they are planning to continue their course or program beyond the grant period, thereby institutionalizing this experiential learning opportunity.

VentureWell encourages proposals that involve students, faculty and advisors from engineering, science, business, design, and liberal arts disciplines, as well as groups traditionally underrepresented in invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship, including women and minorities.

Proposals may include plans for creating or improving an individual course, course sequence, minor, major, certificate program, incubator, accelerator, and other co- and extra-curricular programs.

Faculty grants support educational courses or programs at the intersection of invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship that lead to the creation and support of student teams. Focus areas include, but are not limited to:

  • General (technology-based) entrepreneurship
  • New materials
  • Clean tech/renewable energy innovation
  • Technologies that address poverty alleviation and basic human needs, (including, but not limited to water, sanitation, healthcare, energy, agriculture, shelter)
  • Tech-based entrepreneurship led by women and other underrepresented populations
  • Biomedical and healthcare innovation

VentureWell faculty grants are awarded to US-based colleges and universities. Faculty and staff from VentureWell-member colleges and universities are eligible to apply. Proposals may include non-member partners from education, non-profits, industry, NGOs, governments and/or the investment community, etc. Only University Park and Berks campuses are VentureWell-member colleges and are eligible to apply. Each campus will run their own competition.

The more SPECIFIC, CLEAR and COMPELLING your proposal is, the more competitive it will be. Typically, proposals have approximately a 20% chance of getting funded. Successful faculty grant proposals include these elements:

  • A focus on STEM entrepreneurship.
  • Experiential learning by doing, and creative pedagogical approaches to solving real world problems.
  • The formation of student teams focused on technology invention, innovation and entrepreneurship with a positive social/environmental impact. An intention to encourage the best teams to apply to the VentureWell E-Team program.
  • A supportive entrepreneurial ecosystem for the most promising student teams to pursue commercialization beyond the proposed course/program.
  • A plan for continuation (and financial sustainability) of the course or program post-VentureWell funding.
  • If the program focus is outside the campus community or outside the US, a local partner must be identified.
  • VentureWell welcomes proposals that are multidisciplinary in nature (this is not required as we understand that each campus is different).
  • A simple work plan/table that outlines major milestones during the grant period.

Examples of projects that are NOT strong candidates for faculty grant funding include:

  • Courses and/or programs without a focus on technology innovation and/or entrepreneurship.
  • Pure research projects.
  • Courses and/or programs that are unlikely to continue beyond the grant period.
  • Existing programs where there is little change or improvement proposed (i.e., ongoing support requests).

Course and programs that are disconnected from the entrepreneurial ecosystem on campus/in the community.

  • Courses and/or programs that do not lead to the creation of student teams.
  • Proposals that do not demonstrate support for the most promising technologies and teams beyond the classroom/lab/club.

For more information, please view the guidelines attached to this competition.

Limit (Number of applicants permitted per institution): 
1
Sponsor Final Deadline: 
Nov 06, 2019
OSVPR Application or NOI Instructions: 

Interested applicants should send the following documents in sequence in one PDF file (File name: Last name_VentureWell_2020 no later than 4:00 p.m. on the internal submission deadline:

Cover Page:

  • Principal Investigator’s (PI's) names and departmental affiliation
  • Co-PI's names and departmental affiliation(s)
  • A list of possible participating organizations (if applicable)
  • Proposal Title

Proposal Narrative (no more than two pages):

The more SPECIFIC, CLEAR and COMPELLING your narrative is, the more competitive your proposal will be. Tell the reviewers a story: what currently exists, where are the gaps, what are you proposing to create and what are the hoped-for outcomes? In other words, why this idea now?

  • What are you proposing? Is it a course or a program? Is it new or an expansion of existing courses/programs?
  • Differentiate between what already exists vs. what you are asking for funding to support. Emphasis should be placed on what you are proposing, not on what already exists.
  • What is the technology invention/innovation area of focus?
  • Explain the process: how will the proposed course or program lead to the creation of student teams, how will teams be formed and where will the ideas come from?
  • Is there an experiential learning opportunity for students?
  • Is there potential for educational, social and/or environmental impact?
  • How will your entrepreneurship ecosystem support the most promising teams and technologies towards commercialization?

History and Context

  • What gap(s) are you addressing on your campus; what do you feel is missing?
  • What have you accomplished so far if anything? Have you received other support for this work? Limit this to one paragraph.

Team and Partners

  • Describe the role of each key individual involved with delivering/supporting the proposed course and/or program. Keep each description to 1-2 short sentences.
  • Identify partners on campus or beyond who will help promising teams commercialize any resulting technologies. If the proposal focus is outside the campus community or outside the US, please note that an off-campus, local partner is required.
  • Describe the “entrepreneurial ecosystem” on your campus and in the community and how your students will access these resources (other faculty, mentors, departments, entrepreneurship centers, incubators, accelerators, industry, NGOs, governments etc.).

*Note: Proposals should go beyond listing entrepreneurial support resources and demonstrate that a structured path is available for some teams to further develop a path to market.

Letter of Support from Department Head/Chair:

  • Letters of support should demonstrate to reviewers that there is ongoing institutional support for your project and/or technical competence and market opportunity in the proposed work. Letters can also serve to verify partnerships discussed in your proposal narrative or verify additional funding to complement the proposed budget. More weight will be given to letters of support from key administrators and/or community partners. Note that if the proposal focus is outside the campus community or outside the US, at least one off-campus local partner is required, and a letter of support from this partner should be provided.

Formatting Guidelines:

  • Font/size: Times New Roman (12 pt.)
  • Document margins: 1.0” (top, bottom, left and right)
  • Standard paper size (8 ½” x 11)

Questions concerning the limited submissions process may be submitted to limitedsubs@psu.edu.

To be considered as a Penn State institutional nominee, please submit a notice of intent by the date provided directly below.
This limited submission is in downselect: 
Penn State may only submit a specific number of proposals to this funding opportunity. The number of NOIs received require that an internal competition take place, thus, a downselect process has commenced. No Penn State researchers may apply to this opportunity outside of this downselect process. To apply for this limited submission, please use this link:
OSVPR Downselect Deadline: 
Wednesday, October 2, 2019 - 4:00pm
Notes: 
Menold, Jessica (Eng. School of Eng. Design, Technology, and Professional Programs) and Betsy Campbell (Edu. Research Assosciate) 10/16/19