Project Grant 2202184

Northern Virginia Community College will use a $1.3 million project grant from the National Science Foundation's STEM Education program to develop a Product Design Incubator. The incubator aims to foster entrepreneurial and collaboration skills for 60 information and engineering technology students annually through experiential product design training. Key components include entrepreneurship workshops, a summer internship prototyping student product ideas, an industry pitch event, and academic year mentoring. The incubator seeks to advance understanding of how product design and entrepreneurship education can strengthen critical skills needed by regional employers. Results may provide insights for integrating entrepreneurship into technician programs to better develop communication, collaboration, critical thinking and an entrepreneurial mindset.