E-mentor

eMENTOR
TURNING IDEAS INTO SOLUTIONS

Table of
Contents
1. TOMORROW STARTS HERE
2. WHAT’S HOLDINGS US BACK
3. THE ROAD TO DISCOVERY
• INTERVIEWS
• USER PROFILES
• JOURNEY MAPPING
• COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE
4. WHAT WE ENVISION
5. LET’S COLLABORATE
6. THE E-MENTOR
7. TAKING THE LEAD

The World
Needs More
Solutions
We live in a world of constant turmoil with growing
needs and complex problems of global scale on all
fronts - humanitarian, economic, social, environmental,
institutional and governmental - that require our
attention, ideas, determination and collaboration.
The world is in desperate need for solutions.
There’s a lot of talk about making the world a better place but
preaching alone will not do the job. We need to start taking action
and join forces with those individuals who are already driving
change and improving lives by solving one problem at a time.
Progress will not come from one big breakthrough idea or a long
awaited miracle, but rather from a global network of startup
communities, creating and building solutions that will make the
world a truly better place. This is the new generation of super-
heroes, of problem solvers and innovative thinkers, this is the
age of entrepreneurs.
“When you become an entrepreneur, you join a group of people
who are saving the world. Entrepreneurs are one of the single
biggest forces of good on the planet.” Nick Scheidies

ZubaBox is a solar-powered Internet hub that
brings Wi-Fi to the African wilderness and
provides long-term sustainable development
to the world’s poorest countries. To date, it
has provided more than 114,000 computers to
Africa’s most isolated communities.
Bookshare is the world’s largest accessible
online library of copyrighted books for people
with print disabilities such as blindness. The
organization has a network of technology,
corporate and non-profit advisors, as well as a
community of donors.
Why
Startups?
Businesses grow and prosper because of their ability to
understand people’s needs and solve their problems, but old
businesses are often slow to adapt to emerging problems and
that’s where entrepreneurs come in.
Startups are designed from the ground up to solve
today’s problems, creating new opportunities, and
driving advancement and positive social,
economic, and environmental change.
Entrepreneurs create jobs, encourage local commerce, provide free
information and education, fund big ideas and provide affordable
loans to small businesses, start charities and foundations, bring
people together, solve major environmental issues, push science
and medicine to new frontiers, and even help topple totalitarianism.
Hole-in-the-Wall
Hole-in-the-Wall is a free computer built into a
wall to allow poor children in India to use one for
the first time. Since its inception in 1999, Hole-
in-the-Wall has grown from a single computer
in New Delhi to more than 100 computers at
various locations across India and abroad.
Imazon is the first independent deforestation monitoring
system for the Brazilian Amazon, using technical mapping and
satellite imagery. Its mission is to save the Amazon from the
forest floor up, and has pioneered a “Green City,” a model of
sustainability with a new economic approach that has seen
illegal deforestation virtually halted.
This smartphone app monitors changes to skin features, initially
targeting changes in moles as an early warning system for skin
cancer. This turns the smartphone into a data collection device,
which gives doctors more information to aid diagnosis.
trustparency
This storytelling web platform helps charities
create the right level of emotional attachment
for long-term, trust-based relationships. Social
projects can show their donors the social
impact achieved with their contribution by a
transparent approach to funding.

Building
an Army
for Change
And if we zoom in to examine the dynamics that set the foundation
for innovation on an institutional level, we find that education
is at the core of such transformation. Companies increasingly
rely on technology and problem-solving skills to tackle business
challenges, moving away from the constraints of traditional
employment. As such, traditional education, has to shift its
emphasis to include learning opportunities that promote hands-
on skills development where students learn by doing. Classes,
workshops and events, that teach job-specific technical expertise
and provide the experiential learning needed for creating startups,
should be incorporated to support entrepreneurs, and notions
such as collaboration and teamwork should become an integral
part of the learning process.
Last but not least, and in order to stress the importance of the role
that educational institutions play in fostering an entrepreneurial
mindset and paving the way for innovation, the report also states
that university-based ventures are more than 100x more likely to
turn into publicly traded companies than non-university startups.
Tomorrow starts here.
So if the future is in the hands of entrepreneurs, who
is cultivating this power?
According to the report ‘Fostering a Startup and Innovation
Ecosystem’ creating the right environment for entrepreneurship
should be a global concern whereby countries need to develop
the necessary ecosystems for businesses to thrive. Investing in
human capital, creating density of talented thinkers and makers,
highlighting entrepreneurs as role models and accepting failure
as an integral part of the learning process, as well as providing
financing opportunities and policies that support startups, can
all dramatically increase the potential for successful ventures to
emerge and flourish.

What’s
Holding Us
Back
Our programs are academically rigorous and industry focused and
prepare us to be managers who launch and lead organizations
driven by design processes. We are exposed to new contexts and
practices both within and outside of design-based industries, and
obtain cutting-edge analyses of the digital information-based
economy, which gears us towards new business models and
creative organizational designs for all industries. We graduate
with an understanding of the sophisticated real-world
perspectives on business, operations, sustainability,
management, leadership, entrepreneurship, design
innovation, and design research. And in theory, we are
equipped to make the kinds of changes we are being
taught to make.
Many of these graduate programs at Parsons are relatively new
and there is much room to build emphasis in certain areas of
interest. Entrepreneurship according to our survey seems to be
rooted in many of the candidates. Some aim to build new social
enterprises while others want to disrupt long standing industries.
And across the board, they all share the same pain points. The
discrepancy between theory and practice is suddenly exposed when
projects are taken out of the classroom. Projects with immense
potential see their demise at the end of semesters. Discussion and
ideas are quickly walked away from, and in the few cases where
ideas are actually pursued, the journey map reflects one pain point
after the other.
The discrepancy between theory and practice is suddenly
exposed when projects are taken out of the classroom.
As candidates of a Master’s degree at Parsons the New School of
Design, we are learning to become design thinkers and innovation
leaders equipped with the necessary skill set to cope with the
complex global economy and its rapidly evolving standards. We
come from diverse cultural backgrounds, industry professions
and cities and our main goal is to complement our academic
and professional accomplishments with the latest design and
business skills that are proving successful in the new economy.
Parsons’ Graduate programs provide brilliant frameworks and in
depth knowledge into the diverse perspectives of innovation. The
Strategic Design and Management program for instance responds
well to the major restructuring of developed and emerging
economies worldwide, and brings design thinking sustainability
into the foreground. The program aims to create leaders
that will leverage the new economy, take strategic
design to the next level, and lead the future companies
and initiatives that will shape a better world.

Much like a bird and its nest, a graduate student is expected to
connect the dots and build and leverage a network that helps bring
ideas to life. The effort, dedication and motivation factors are
indispensable in an entrepreneurial endeavor. And it is not up to a
school or anyone to pave the way for one’s own success. However,
there are initiatives, resources and platforms that could promote
and endorse one’s journey, elevate many unnecessary roadblocks,
and fuel the entrepreneurial ambitions. The New School has set
the stage for many of these initiatives and resources. Many of
them have proven to be very helpful. Others were either not well
communicated, well targeted, too narrow in scope, too broad in
scope, or simply not practical. The result of the baseline after much
research reveals that today, current and graduating students at
Parsons do not feel they have the required mentorship, guidance
and resources to bring their ideas to life. Even with the utmost effort
to connect all the dots, students find that there are broken links
and many opportunities to rethink the elementary design of these
initiatives. Like the elevators in many of the buildings of the New
School, there has been significant investments and efforts to elevate
the student body – however, not to its best potential.
Today, current and graduating
students at Parsons do not feel
they have the required mentorship,
guidance and resources to bring
their ideas to life.
The number of startups is one major indicator and metric of the
school’s success in molding successful innovators and leaders.
Most other schools pride themselves with dedicated sections
on their website, proudly flaunting company logos and success
metrics of their own graduates. A rich and varied portfolio has
always proven to be one of the most effective tools to build
credibility for prospective applicants to the school, collaborators
and all stakeholders. Therefore, it should be a school’s priority to
provide and communicate the venues and resources available, and
constantly thrive to expand the different initiatives that prepare
entrepreneurs for the real world.
What are the resources currently available? What
are their strengths and weaknesses? Where do
the opportunities and threats lie? What does the
ecosystem of graduate schools in New York look like?
What is our offered solution? How is it scalable? How
does it help our world become a better place?

Our hypotheses were developed based on our own experiences
and that of our fellow peers both in Design & Technology and SDM
within the graduate programs of Parsons. Taking a step back, as
we embarked on this journey, we were hoping to create something
that would have lasting positive value. We used a rigorous
evaluation process to identify and filter through a multitude of
ideas. Although many of the proposals were promising, none of
them really resonated with us. In order to determine the way
forward for the semester and tackle a problem that we could
better relate to, we looked at the process from a new angle. We
tried to understand the underlying reasons as to why some ideas
that have great potential to positively impact our world are not
followed through, and we wore the shoes of social entrepreneurs.
It quickly became clear that our shoes were shiny on the outside,
glamorous even – but they were only meant for display. This is true
not just for those of us who want to make a social impact, but also
those who want to embark on any kind of entrepreneurial journey
during or post graduate studies. The fact of the matter is, and one
of our interviewees said it best, “we feel ready to embark on the
entrepreneurial path while going through our programs, but then
reality strikes - we don’t even know where to begin.” - Nathalie
Neumann, SDM Graduate, 2015
The
Road to
Discovery
“We feel ready to embark on the entrepreneurial path while
going through our programs, but then reality strikes - we don’t
even know where to begin” - Nathalie Neumann, SDM Graduate, 2015

We tried to understand the
underlying reasons as to why some
ideas that have great potential to
positively impact our world are not
followed through.
Interviews
BRAND
BRA
N
D
It came as no surprise the overwhelming validation
we received, one interview after the other.
In fact, more than 20 in depth interviews
were conducted with 1st
year, 2nd
year, SDM
and DT students as well as professors and
staff. A significant amount of time was
spent into this exploratory qualitative
phase of this assignment, aiming to
identify discrepancies between what is
offered, what is communicated and what
is missing. The pain points were
more or less the same and revolved
around the roadblocks that students
come across be it in the decision to
start a venture, or in the actual process
of going from idea to startup.

Who did we
interview?
1st
Year
SDM & DT
2nd
Year
SDM & DT
Professors Professionals

Pain point #1
The first pain point revolves around mentorship and risk. Each
person has a propensity for risk, and no matter what the level of
tolerance, not having a mentoring body or go to place beyond the
professors does not help alleviate the burden. In fact, many of our
interviewees felt that with the proper guidance in the early stages,
they would have been encouraged to follow through their ideas,
knowing that an expert or a credible source has looked at their
proposals with a critical eye and has provided recommendations
on the way forward. Resources and mechanisms are numerous but
alas not part of our school’s current model.
Pain point #2
The second pain point was mainly around the ‘gap’. Not everyone comes
from a business background, and most of our interviewees, even those
that do come from the corporate world felt that there was one or several
areas within the Business Model side of things that were detrimental to
the process. The most recurring area of weakness was finance. “This is
supposed to be a startup, and we are still too early in the process to start
hiring people with expertise in different fields. We need to be able to at least
create a sound financial model for our idea. Without those numbers, who is
going to take us seriously?”. Although some programs do provide a Business
Modeling course, and the Business Model Canvas is tackled, things are as
one interviewee mentioned “quite high level” and “not really actionable in
the real world”. Often times, ideas are put to rest simply because student
do not feel they have accessible resources to tap into to find the answers
they need. A designer should be able to go beyond his practice and speak the
business language that will determine the viability of his practice. The lack
of resources that bridge this gap, especially in programs like SDM where the
program is partly a management program, is therefore critical in a student’s
ability and motivation to strive. “Micro- and Macro- Econ courses at the
beginning of the semester do not bridge this gap” confirmed one interviewee.
It is beyond that - it is about having a go-to person or place that provides
recommendations for a student’s particular situation.
Pain point #3
The third pain point was indeed painful across the board. Every
single person we interviewed faced or anticipated to face
problems in the Legal area. This branches out into a multitude of
issues that can be bucketed in two categories:
1. Immigration issues for International Students
2. Registration, trademarks, intellectual property
“What type of company do we start? How do we register? How
long does it take? How do we sustain ourselves financially
throughout these processes without knowing how long they
might be and what they entail?”. These are only a few
of the questions that were brought up during the
interviews. The list went on, and the truth of the matter
is, the current model does not make things any easier
for students. The ISSS is certainly driving efforts in
addressing issues for International Students. But it has
its limitations in scope of what they can do, and their
focus is not geared towards international entrepreneurs.
“Even within their basic functions, it is not a place to
go to get answers” said one interviewee. “The school
is predominantly filled with international students and
professors, that is where all the money comes from -
how is this reflected in the resources that are offered
to us as international students?” Beyond ISSS, some
programs (e.g. the SDM) introduced a Regulatory and
Ethical Contexts course where students explore the
legal and ethical dimensions of current innovative design-
intensive companies, and understand the Anglo-American
legal and regulatory regime at a high level. This course,
although valuable firstly because of the contact with
potentially lawyer professors and secondly because of its
content, “does not really add much practical value to us”
said graduating second year SDM students.

Pain point #5
The fifth pain point is around prototyping. It is beyond the 3D
printing machines that only a few know of. It is about having
the resources, space, and guidance to prototype, a collaborative
space for all student and faculty to develop physical products,
devices or even concepts as part of their startups and get help
to build better and faster. We are designers, and are lucky to
have amongst us all the talent in the world. The pain point lies
in the lack of collaboration between programs, professors and
departments. A Design and Technology graduate student would
highly benefit from the Strategy and Design thinking skills of an
SDM graduate student. Likewise, SDM students would find many
answers and skills throughout the prototyping phases of their
ideas if they just looked across the hall. These were the kinds of
suggestions our interviewees made, the kinds of collaborations
they would greatly benefit from to partially address the lack of
resources for prototyping. And once again, it seemed like the
students had to connect all the dots themselves, and that the
culture for collaboration was not an overarching one.
Pain point #4
The fourth pain point was around funding. The entire sub-process
reveals pain points and at different stages; writing a pitch deck,
the actual practice of pitching, to finding funding entities like
Venture Capital firms and other institutions, etc… for the few
who have the courage to get to this stage, this is where the story
ends. A second year student mentioned that they were never
put in a situation whereby they could pitch their ideas to ‘sharks’
- not a real life or even a simulated situation. Other students
mentioned that it was always a student and sometimes Professor
initiative to find events to see the practice in action. Without
funding, most ideas never get to know anything other than
the font in which they have been written. Writing a solid pitch,
building the skills to present to potential investors or partners,
having access to Venture Capital firms, Alumni, professionals,
companies, deals with banks tailored for Parsons students - all
were aspirations of our peers. For those who are going through
it, they feel they are completely alone, and for those who plan
to go through it, they fear this phase the most as they feel they
would have absolutely no support from their alma mater. This
is not necessarily a curriculum based issue, but rather a lack of
entrepreneurial directive overall.

Initiatives are there. Sometimes poorly communicated, sometimes
not comprehensive, maybe even inefficient. Other initiatives are
in the pipeline, some with great promise, some with anticipated
flaws. Ultimately, the aim is not to reinvent the wheel. It is
important to capitalize on what has been working and what
promises to work well for the entrepreneurs of our graduate
programs. But it is of utmost importance to look into all the pain
points and realize that a holistic and centralized solution does not
yet exist, and with the bits and pieces that do exist, the user is
definitely not the hero of their design. Our interviewees recognize
that Design school was a choice. For those in the SDM program,
most came in hoping for less of a trade-off with what they
could get from an MBA or a management program. And overall,
design school should not imply no resources for entrepreneurs.
Granted, it is fundamentally a student’s job to connect the dots.
But an entrepreneurial infrastructure and culture
through a robust student centered model would
definitely help address these pain points, help students
better connect those dots and eventually create the
momentum for change. A change that will only reflect
on the School’s potential to be the leader in change.
It is of utmost importance to look into all the pain points and
realize that a holistic and centralized solution does not yet exist,
and with the bits and pieces that do exist, the user is definitely
not the hero of their design.

ARE YOU CONSIDERING
STARTING YOUR OWN BUSINESS?
WHICH TOOLS AND RESOURCE DO YOU NEED IN
ORDER TO HELPYOU MOVE FORWARD?
WHAT DO YOU FEEL IS LACKING IN YOUR PRO-
GRAM THAT COULD HELPYOU MOVE FORWARD?
HOWAREYOU ADDRESSING LEGAL ISSUES
WITH REGARDS TOYOUR INNOVATION?
HOW ARE YOU ADDRESSING FINANCIAL ISSUES
WITH REGARDS TO YOUR INNOVATION?
HOW DO YOU FEEL IN TERMS OF RISK?
DO YOU FEELYOU ARE PREPARED ENOUGH TO
BECOME AN ENTREPRENEUR? DO YOU HAVE
THE NECESSARYTOOLS AND RESOURCES TO
EXECUTE YOUR IDEA?
ARE YOU AN INTERNATIONAL STUDENT, AND IF
SO ARE YOU PLANING TO LOOK FOR OPPORTU-
NITIES IN NEWYORK OR GO BACK HOME? WHY?
Yes definitely,
but I don’t know
where to start
“Real startup
practice!”
“Personal
savings so far”
“Seek counsel”
“Elective classes that would help me
become better equipped to move forward
with my business”
“Maintaining very low overhead and
financing out of pocket for now”
“Centralized information on
available resources”
MENTORSHIP
FUNDING
Yes absolutely
It slows me down
Honestly, I don’t know
where to start
I’m well prepared and ready for
whatever is required
I think about it but
I’m not sure I’ve got
what it takes
LEGAL ADVICE
KNOW-HOW
Not yet but I’m
working on it
It’s part of the
process
Q.
Q.
Q.
Q.
Q.
Q.
Q.
Q.
45%
A.
A.
A.
34%
10%
No, I’m an
American citizen30%
30%
18%
10%
0%
55%
34%
22%
I’m an international student and I plan to go back
home because it’s easier for me to make it there20%
I’m an international student and I want to try and
make it in New York but paperwork is an issue40%
Yes, I’m an international student and I’m already
developing my business here10%
65%
82%
“Business knowledge - how to
create profit projections for pitching
investors”
“Trying to put a budget together and
then I will seek private investors”
“Online research, but it would be
good to understand patents better”
Survey
“Incubator”
“Saving up”
“Business mentorship”
“Google”

User Profiles
Charles
23 / American
GRAPHIC DESIGNER
MFA in
Design & Technology
First Year
“I don’t understand how to navigate numbers
and legal stuff”
“I usually get information from informal
networks at school. I would like to build my
professional connections to open new doors to
new opportunities”
“What is the starting point?”
“How can I start a team?”
PAIN POINTS
• Prototype | 5
• Legal | 2
• Guidance | 3
• Financial | 1
• Network | 1
Christina
32 / American
BRAND DESIGNER
MS in
Strategic Design & Management
Second Year
“So I have a great idea and prototype...
Now what?”
“Who can I talk to about moving my project one
step further?”
“I wish I could learn more practical business skills
through this program”
“How do I create a perfect startup pitch deck?”
“How can I find a financial advisor I can trust?
PAIN POINTS
• Prototype | 2
• Legal | 3
• Guidance | 1
• Financial | 4
• Network | 5
Jaskir
28 / Indian
ENGINEER
MFA in
Transdisciplinary Design
First Year
“I attended the Interpreneur series, but I honestly
don’t feel I got any new direction or insight”
“I can’t get a concrete answer from anyone
at ISSS!”
“So what if I have a great idea, I will never be
able to execute it because of immigration issues”
“Who can i contact for legal advice?”
PAIN POINTS
• Prototype | 5
• Legal | 1
• Guidance | 3
• Financial | 2
• Network | 3
The key points and insights taken from the interviews
were translated to create diverse personas, representing
those who are and those who are not interested in
pursuing entrepreneurship.

Core
Stakeholder
GRADUATE STUDENTS
INTERNATIONAL
& LOCAL
ALUMNI
FACULTY & STAFF
PROFESSORS
Direct
Stakeholders
Wider
Network
PROFESSIONAL
NETWORK
PARTNERS THE NEW
SCHOOL
OTHER
INSTITUTIONS
Stakeholders
Map

Journey
Mapping
The following journeys were mapped, allowing the identification
of key touch-points and moments in the process, and determining
whether they were positive or negative attributes.
In synthesizing the research, our team was able to affiliate a
motivation with each identified moment in the journey map. Each
motivation provided an explanation of students’ actions at that
specific point in the experience. By pinpointing these motivations,
generative questions emerged like “so, what does this mean?” and
helped develop the process to further generate key insights for
the following phases of the project.

IDEA
I have an idea!
LEARNING
Through my courses and personal
research I’m learning and gathering
valuable information and insights
that are helping me develop and
validate my idea further.
PROTOTYPING & TESTING
We have started prototyping
our solution and testing it at
various stages.
INSIGHT & JOB-TO-BE-DONE
With team effort and guidance from our
professors we are applying the methodologies
we learned to frame our insights and discover
the job-to-be-done.
MAP
We are excited about moving
on to developing our Minimum
Awesome Product.
PROJECT
As part of my coursework, I now
have the chance to turn my idea
into a real project within an
academic framework.
SOLUTION
We have tested our MVP
and believe we’ve nailed
the solution.
TARGET CUSTOMER
We now have clearly framed
our target customer, developed
our user proﬁles, and nailed
down the biggest problem they
are facing.
BUSINESS MODEL
Now it’s time to work on the
business model. We’re not
really sure about lots of aspects
like revenue streams and cost
structure so we’ll settle for
rough estimates.
RESEARCH
Through pain-storming, market
and customer research, and
interviews, we are validating
our assumptions.
DRAWER
We have a great deck but after
the presentation the project
goes into the drawer and we
move on to the next...
VISION
We have synthesized a clear
vision statement.
From Idea to Drawer

User Journeys
IDEA + CONCEPT PROTOTYPING
& TESTING
BUSINESS MODEL LEGAL
ADVICE
IMMIGRATION
ISSUES
FUNDING NETWORKINGADVISORRESEARCH

The ISSS
Experience
were represented by points situated above the line. The journey’s
aim is to display several layers of information like the duration
of waiting, the amount of frustration along the process and the
quality of the counseling experience altogether.
Key Takeaways
The overall feedback regarding the CPT process was highly
negative and all participants emphasized that they did not receive
the necessary information from advisors but from classmates who
have gone through the same process earlier. The map illustrates
the main issues that arose during the CPT process.
Our team has also conducted one-on-one interviews with three
international students who recently got an internship offer in
New York. The collected data from the students triggered rich and
insightful user journeys that illustrated the patterns observed from
the current CPT application process and the feelings and thoughts
that emerged while contacting both ISS and Experience Department.
This qualitative method was the backbone of the ideation and
prototyping steps that followed. The curvy lines of the journey map
fluctuate between negative experiences, which were represented
by points situated below the line, and positive experiences, which
Send an Email to ISSS (April 7)
>> Reminder Email Sent (April 9)
>> No Reply (Until April 20) Without further instruction
i.e. course registration, CPT process
Received a reply from ISS
regarding the course registration process
Automatic confirmation email (April 17)
>> Update news from the Experience Dept. (April 17)
Internship offer
Search for
contact person
Find answer
from other students
Find answer
from other students
Done with course
registration
Filled out the
Experience Learning
Agreement form
‘Letter of Eligibility’
from the Experience
Department Email for
further clarification
: IGNORED
A Walk-in with ISS advisor
: NO CLEAR ANSWER
Received an email
from ISS regarding
further instruction
Contact ISSS
: IGNORED
Done with the whole
CPT process, receiving
a new I20- from ISS
We recommend you to wait until ISS sends you a
confirmation letter with instruction. At this moment,
unfortunately, there is nothing I can help you.
APRIL 6 MAY 4

What
is Parsons
Offering Us?
After validating the identified pain points with in depth
one-on-one interviews and surveys, and understanding
and mapping the journeys of the selected personas,
our insights were further solidified and the job-to-
be-done was ever more so clear. In order to further
validate our hypotheses, we conducted research to
find out what available resources does The New School
provide its students.

The eLab
Helping alumni students
transition to entrepreneurs
It was insightful to find that the School of Design strategies has an
initiative called the eLab which helps alumni students transition
to entrepreneurs through matching the students with New York
incubators and accelerators. So far the program has attracted
several alumni groups of students, 4 of which are incubated at
the Center for Social Innovation with mentorship from two Design
Strategies professors from Parsons. The initiative is not yet well
communicated; most students mentioned throughout the research
phase that they have not heard of it. The accepted alumni groups
need to be at a relatively advanced stage, having demonstrating
at least some exchange to prove the viability of their ventures.
Financials need to be set as well as the business model developed.
The mentors aid with creating contacts between the alumni and
seed capital, incubators and accelerators. They also facilitate
midway and final presentations to the mentors as well as the Dean
and associate dean of the School of Design Strategies to monitor
the group’s’ progress. The eLab is still in its early stages.
It has very promising future plans and aims to become
more comprehensive in terms of what it provides to
the students.
A buy-in and endorsement from the different stakeholders of The
New School and a well planned communication plan could lead to
the launch of more and more ventures, ones that will reflect on the
school’s success and commitment to produce change makers.

Foster creativity
within the international
community
Another initiative by the Center for Student Success is the
Interpreneurship Program. It is a pilot program designed for
international students who want to become entrepreneurs
and want to better understand how they can start their own
companies in the U.S.
This program aims to provide valuable tools for
entrepreneurial students who have their big idea but
do not know how to go through the execution phases
due to U.S. immigration rules.
The vision for the program is to create an internal Interpreneurial
Incubator at The New School. As part of the research phases
and to better understand the current initiatives, members from
our project team attended a few of the hosted spring events
and to their dismay, they were not able to gather any executable
advice. One of the events focused on the Legal issues with regards
to opening a business as an International student. When one
student asked where can all the presented information be
found, the reply was that it was everywhere. Information is not
collated on one database, therefore making it a tedious and
sometimes very arduous task to find relevant information. This
is particularly true when visiting the ISSS office which despite all
its efforts is still not a go-to place for many students. As shown
on one of our journey maps, it is ill organized and inefficient,
creating frustration for the International student that is looking
for concrete answers.
The Social Innovation Initiative at The New School is another
initiative focused on a collaboration between New School
students, faculty, and administrators to create a program
incubator for diverse activities that will accelerate, broaden
and deepen social entrepreneurship and social innovation
education at the university. The New Challenge, a project of the
Social Innovation Initiative, is a competition to grant funding,
mentorship, and learning opportunities for students from across
the university with ideas who want to make a difference in the
world. Winners will receive awards up to $10,000 to develop their
ideas and to take them to the next level of implementation.

What is really in the pipeline
and what is the roadmap for
implementation for these
initiatives?
Social Impact, Entrepreneurship
& Design is a course that a second
year student introduced us to
through an in-depth interview.
The course provides students
with the opportunity to develop
and expand their ideas to
address social and environmental
challenges and create actionable
plans to move them forward.
With this course, as mentioned by our interviewee who is a
teacher’s assistant to the course, students are able to move past the
prototyping stage where they learn more about the Legal, Financials,
and Intellectual Property aspects and are therefore better prepared
to apply to fellowships and competitions to attain funding and
move forward in their projects. Something that, as seen with our
interviews and surveys, is missing as an integral part of our practice.
Other resources available to The New School students include a list
of competitions found on the Social Innovation Initiative. Beyond
the programs listed above, there are no resources readily available
for entrepreneurial students. There seems to be future plans that
aim to bridge the gap for many students’ business acumen by
facilitating microeconomics and macroeconomics weekly boot camps.
Importantly, the creation of the Venture Lab, a solution targeted
for entrepreneurial students and aiming to address many of the
highlighted pain points, is a future plan, currently in the discussion
phases, for the school to instigate a mentorship initiative that also
includes networking, collaboration, and legal guidance. Granted there
are a great many “future” initiatives for the students that will address
many of the pain points. That is in itself validation that pain points
do exists, and the need to address them is critical. nevertheless we
can not help but wonder what is really in the pipeline and what is the
roadmap for implementation for these initiatives?

Parsons
Initiatives
CURRENT INITIATIVES
eLAB
Social Innovation Initiative
Interpreneurship Program
and Design Course
FUTURE INITIATIVES
Comprehensive eLAB
The Venture Lab
Microeconomics and
Macroeconomics weekly
boot camps
CURRENT INITIATIVES
eLAB
Social Innovation Initiative
Interpreneurship Program
and Design Course
Comprehensive eLAB
the Venture Lab
Microeconomics and
Macroeconomics
weekly boot camps
FUTURE INITIATIVES

The Competitive
Landscape
This lead us to further our research and assess the
‘competitive landscape’ or graduate program ecosystem
and the initiatives offered to students in New York. We
researched other prominent universities and programs
to get a clearer picture to what is missing for us as
students at Parsons.
NYU, for example, has the Entrepreneurial Institute which is a
university-wide initiative to accelerate the pace of technology
commercialization and the launch of successful startups. It is
formed of NYU’s 60,000 students, faculty and researchers.
The Institute’s team of startup experts and thought leaders offers
educational programming, events, resources, and funding through
many different programs. The Mark and Debra Leslie Entrepreneurs
Lab is a 5,900-square-foot facility where NYU entrepreneurs
from across all of NYU’s schools and colleges can meet to connect,
collaborate, and tap into a vast array of resources to help develop
their ideas and inventions into startup companies.

NYU
The Leslie eLab
The Leslie eLab features co-working spaces, meeting rooms, an
event space, and a fabrication lab to encourage interactions,
prototyping, and collaborations that are essential in the
development of entrepreneurial ideas. The NYU Leslie eLab has a
prototyping space for all student and faculty developing physical
products and devices as part of their startups. It is open and
staffed thirty hours a week by experts available to help students
and faculty build better and faster. The equipment includes 2wo
Makerbot Fifth Generation Replicators 3D printers, one Makerbot
Digitizer 3D scanner, one Forty Watt CO2 Laser Cutter with a 40”
cut-bed, assorted sensors: accelerometers, barometers, light, ph
level and soldering irons, drills, pliers, etc. The equipment and
supplies in the Leslie eLab are free for all students, faculty, and
researchers at NYU.

Made by NYU
Made by NYU is a site within the Entrepreneurial Institute that showcases companies founded by NYU students, faculty and alumni.
It is very impressive to scroll down through the companies and see Pinterest, Twitter, Etsy, Seamless, TaskRabbit, Audible, just to
name a few, prominent startups. This exemplifies a sense of NYU’s pride, especially for the up and coming entrepreneur who is looking
for mentorship and guidance. The NYU Entrepreneurs Blog keeps a report on all things entrepreneurial at NYU including recaps on
recent events, updates on NYU incubated startups and perspectives on leading with an entrepreneurial spirit. In addition to all these
initiatives, there are workshops, seminars, and classes that focus on bridging the gaps for students coming from different backgrounds
and that are looking to become entrepreneurs.

Berkley Center for
Entrepreneurship and
Innovation at Stern NYU
The Venture Mentor Network is a program that matches NYU
entrepreneurs with mentors. The mentors are alumni and
networks of seasoned entrepreneurs, investors and professionals
ready to aid early-stage teams through the challenges of moving
forward. Mentoring programs are custom built and catered to
the entrepreneurs and their needs. The NYU Innovation Venture
Fund is a seed-stage venture capital fund created to invest in NYU
startups. Established in June 2010, this initiative is part of the
University’s on-going commitment to entrepreneurship. The fund
is open to proposals from students, faculty and researchers at
various schools. NYU initially capitalized the Fund with more than
$3 million and anticipates this growing to $20 million, with tax-
deductible donor contributions. The Fund will make approximately
five investments per year, from $100,000 - $500,000, in
partnership with angel investors and/or venture capital firms.
The Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) program is a university
wide program sponsored by the Berkley Center with support from
the NYU Innovation Venture Fund. The EIR Program supports the
growing rate of early-stage technology commercialization and
entrepreneurship across the University. EIRs are founders of or
former senior executives from successful entrepreneurial ventures
that work closely with NYU students, researchers, faculty and
“In a business world of non-stop change, there’s only one
way to win the game: Transform it entirely. Our mission: To
develop serial innovators capable of launching and leading
organizations that challenge assumed boundaries and
inspire a sense of what’s possible.” Berkley Center
The Help Desk, at the Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship and
Innovation in Stern, is an educational resource that is staffed by
seasoned professionals and subject matter experts who are ready
to answer any questions related to the student’s venture. Their
areas of assistance include accounting, brand & media relations,
legal, and sales and marketing. The Help Desk is available once or
twice a month and by appointment.
The Innovation Lab is a 12 week seminar series and program
designed to train students on how to create commercially viable
innovations. Students, alumni and faculty collaborate to work on
new products, services and business models generated among the
group. The Lab trains participants to refine their innovations, build
portfolios of patents and other intangible assets to protect their
innovations, and license and sell those assets to the market.

Harvard was another institution that we researched. The most
prominent initiative there is the i-lab which was launched in 2011 as a
resource for students interested in entrepreneurship and innovation.
The programs offered by the i-lab are designed to aid students grow
their ventures at any stage of development and cover a wide range
of disciplines. The i-lab is even open for community members to
attend many of the events and utilize the community lobby open
workspace and WiFi. Additionally, a number of community partners,
including the Small Business Administration, The Service Corps of
Retired Executives, The Center for Women and Enterprise, and the
Massachusetts Small Business Development Center host events,
meetings, and office hours at the i-lab.
“50% of our alumni describe
themselves as entrepreneurs
within 10-15 years after
graduation. With 90,000 living
HBS alumni, that’s a lot of
entrepreneurs.” HBS
Harvard
alumni who are founders of very early-stage ventures. They
provide consulting, coaching and mentoring designed to help these
founders take their venture concepts to the next level. They aid
in business models and strategy, technology commercialization
and product development plans, go-to-market plans and strategies,
evaluating funding needs and identifying financing options,
forming strategic partnerships and talent acquisition and
compensation strategies.
The $200K Entrepreneurs Challenge is yet another initiative that
includes 3 competitions that give students the opportunity to receive
startup cash, training assistance and individualized coaching from
experienced entrepreneurs, investors and executives.
There are a few more initiatives under the NYU umbrella but
these are the most prominent ones. It is therefore quite clear that
although not completely holistic, there is a solid ecosystem and
infrastructure for entrepreneurship, as well as diversified outlets
that aid students and faculty members in finding answers to
critical questions.

The i-lab’s approach differs than that of other entrepreneurship
centers in its breadth, operating model, and governance. Firstly,
it accepts any student from any Harvard school with any idea,
fostering cross-disciplinary, cross-university collaboration. Secondly,
it is student centered and faculty enabled, with programming
supplied by schools across Harvard to help students take their
ideas as far as possible. Third, the i-lab serves as a new model for
university collaboration as it is co-governed by each of the Deans
of Harvard and the Provost.
Fostering Innovation
and Entrepreneurship
Across Harvard
The pedagogy that the i-lab follows is based on a four-
part approach.
The first part of the approach is based on Foundational Learning
which is the educational entry point for exploring entrepreneurship
and innovation and consists of courses, skill-based workshops,
seminar videos, presentation materials, and guides. The second
part of the approach is Expert Resources for students who have
identified their venture and it includes 75 evening workshops and
seminars hosted by the i-lab, one-on-one office hours with over
25 Experts-in-Residence, and 4 partner law firms in addition to
support from Community Partner organizations. The third part of
the approach is Experiential Learning Experience for students and

teams wanting to test and refine their ideas and ventures by
placing them in “learning by doing” environments like Challenge
competitions, week-long trips to vibrant startup ecosystems
including Silicon Valley, New York City, and Boston, Weekend
hackathons, Scrambles, and Coding Bootcamps, and a Startup
Career fair. The fourth and final part of the approach is the Venture
Incubation System for student-led teams whose ventures have
progressed to a more advanced stage. The i-lab offers the Venture
Incubation Program (VIP) during the Spring, Summer, and Fall of
each calendar year which provides additional resources, including
dedicated workspace, guided mentoring, private workshops, and a
number of community building events. It exemplifies a community
where the diverse skills and backgrounds of the students, mentors,
and staff are leveraged. All in all, The i-lab operates as a startup
within the larger university environment.
In addition to their In addition to their famous HBS case method,
an interesting course that prepares students for their roles as
entrepreneur is the FIELD course (Field Immersion Experiences
in Leadership Development) at Harvard Business School (HBS)
designed for first-year MBA students. It is a year-long, three-part
course divided into FIELD 1 which focuses on leadership styles,
FIELD 2 focuses on global intelligence and FIELD 3 Integrative
Intelligence where students are evaluated on the “micro-business”
they jointly conceive, form, and fund (each venture receives $3,000
from HBS in seed money), then launch and commercialize. Students
are graded on market results rather than presentation and theory.

Empowering
Student and Alumni
Entrepreneurs
The Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship empowers student
and alumni entrepreneurs to create ventures that revolutionize.
”The future of this nation lies with new ventures,” Rock
said. “They supply the new ideas, the new technologies,
the new jobs. HBS has long been at the forefront of
understanding the many facets of the entrepreneurial
process, from the intricacies of finance to the art of
leadership, and I am delighted to be able to support
those efforts both now and for the future.”
It has earned a reputation as the top program for entrepreneurial
studies. Their initiatives — from the New Venture Competition
to the Rock Accelerator to the Rock 100 — have become known
as powerful tools for would-be entrepreneurs to experience the
practical reality of starting up. The New Venture Competition
supports students and alumni launching new business and social
impact ventures. The Rock Accelerator is an innovative and
competitive year long program providing 15 founding teams with
up to $7,500 each in seed capital, matched mentors, and facilitated
peer exchange. The Rock 100 is a worldwide exclusive HBS network
for founders of early stage, high impact ventures. One must apply
and be accepted to join this network of alumni entrepreneurs.

Columbia
Entrepreneurship at Columbia, termed Columbia Entrepreneurship
was founded in the summer of 2013. Their mission is “to support,
invigorate, accelerate and motivate the Columbia community’s
programs and culture around innovation, creativity and
entrepreneurship.” Their mandate is to find ways to take advantage
of the enormous power, vitality and resources of the entire university.
Their method is to encourage the partnerships between schools and
institutes, students and alumni, the NYC community and government
officials. The Columbia Startup Lab is a joint venture between five
important Columbia schools and Columbia Entrepreneurship. It is a
5,100 sq.ft. co-working facility located at WeWork Soho West that
provides subsidized space for 71 Columbia alumni entrepreneurs
to house and nurture their fledgling ventures. Likewise, the annual
#StartupColumbia Festival is a partnership among Columbia
Entrepreneurship, two student entrepreneurship clubs, Barnard,
and the schools of Business and Engineering to bring together the
“Our mission is to support, invigorate,
accelerate and motivate the Columbia
community’s programs and culture
around innovation, creativity and
entrepreneurship.” Columbia Entrepreneurship
entire community to discuss the most important topics in creative
venture building. The Columbia Entrepreneurship Coaches Network
is a program for students who have developed ideas and are ready
to start with their venture; the students are paired up with a coach
for some helpful discussions and high-level coaching.

Stanford
Influenced by the spirit of Silicon Valley, the Stanford Innovation
and Entrepreneurship professional certificate program is designed
to foster the student’s ability to think differently in their quest to
develop innovative products, services and organizations. It is a
partnership between the Stanford School of Engineering and the
Stanford Graduate School of Business. The Stanford Graduate
School of Business Entrepreneurship Club is one of the oldest
student-run entrepreneur’s clubs in the nation. The goal of the
current GSB Entrepreneurship Club is to stimulate interest in
entrepreneurialism among students and other members of the
Stanford community. The club aims to provide their members
with a lifelong learning & support platform to minimize risk and
maximize success in ventures, and to promote the entrepreneurial
mind-set both as a founder or manager of a startup as well as in
the roles of an investor, advisor, or corporate partner. The vision of
the e-club is to be the focal point for all startups at Stanford.

Pratt
Pratt Design Incubator for Sustainable Innovation was created
with the purpose of providing a place for Pratt’s entrepreneurial
alumni to transform their ideas into viable businesses. It is now
open to the public where the incubator provides space and ongoing
strategic mentorship. The incubator supports its startups with
custom-tailored services for doing business in a sustainable way.
The startups have access to a training curriculum in Sustainable
Entrepreneurship and to mentorship-based coaching. The incubator
provides access to Markets, Networks, Office Infrastructure, Training,
Talent and Capital to their entrepreneurs.

Schools in The
Form of Incubators
We also researched schools in the form of incubators like The
DOSchool, 30 Weeks, Dorm Room Fund NYC amongst others.
The DOSchool, with main campus in Hamburg Germany and
a pop-up campus in New York City offers a one year program
that is designed to train, mentor, and empower emerging social
entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs to work together on campus and
then kickstart their own ventures in their home country. Utilizing
the DOSchool method of DREAM (idea generation and out-of the
box thinking), FOCUS (iterative feedback process, observation and
prototyping, stakeholder mapping and role plays) PLAN ( transition
between idea and implementation, project planning, strategic
planning, budgeting, and tools for team management) and DO
(supporting the implementation of a venture). The program takes
place in two phases, a ten-week Incubation Phase on campus and
a ten-month Implementation Phase in the Fellows’ home countries
working on their venture startups.

30 Weeks
30 Weeks is a similar program but focused on designers. It is
“an experimental program to give talented designers the hands-
on experience, mentorship, critiques, tools, workspace, and
connection to the communities they need to create products and
start companies that may just change the world.”
The aim of 30 weeks is to act as a technology start-up
eliminating wasted effort and maximizing speed to help
transform designers into founders.
They follow a learn-by-launching structure which gives participants
a chance to build their entrepreneurship skills in an environment
that’s as close to the real thing as possible. They offer start-up
mentorship, discussions with industry leaders, real tools, group
critiques, hands-on-help, a space to work and time to focus on your
own product. The school collaborates with The New School Parsons,
SVA, Google Hyper Island, Pratt and the CooperUnion.
“Very few companies are actually founded and led by designers. Here to
change that is 30 Weeks, a new program by a powerhouse team of New
York design schools — in collaboration with the education company Hyper
Island and Google.”Fast Company, Named 30 Weeks one of the World’s Top 10 Most Innovative Companies of 2015 in Design

Others
Dorm Room Fund NYC is a student-run venture firm that invests
in student-run companies in the Greater New York area. The team
is made up of students and aims to help peers build amazing
companies. They do this by providing initial seed financing
(generally $20,000), business and legal resources, and connections
to experienced mentors and the broader DRF student community.
Above that, as a team, they are all passionate about helping their
peers start amazing companies, and are there to help fellow
students in any way they can (even if they are not investors).
Other interesting initiatives we found were Startup weekends
which provide hands-on experiences where entrepreneurs and
aspiring entrepreneurs can find out if startup ideas are viable.
Google for entrepreneurs provides aspiring entrepreneurs financial
support and the best of Google’s resources to startup communities
that equip and nurture them. It partners with startups and builds
campuses where entrepreneurs can learn, connect, and create
companies that will change the world.
The Unreasonable Institute gets entrepreneurs what they need
to scale solutions to the world’s biggest problems by identifying
entrepreneurs with the potential to address issues such as poverty,
lack of education, and social injustice at scale, and then by swarming
them with mentors, funders, and partners to help grow their impact.
“Our goal is to help each of these ventures scale up to meaningfully
impact the lives of at least one million people each.”

Existing
Platforms
and Solutions
In addition to programs offered by schools and institutions that
are targeting graduate students, our team also investigated
existing platforms that provide support for entrepreneurs. We
found that there are already many existing platforms that try to
solve the job-to-be-done for those who pursue entrepreneurship.
However, they are not necessarily focusing on the specific needs
of graduate students.
These platforms offer a variety of services including networking,
funding, education, advice and employment. This research gave
us valuable insights which inspired our team to bring our concept
to the prototype phase. However, we discovered that those
platforms lack legal support and advice for issues such as patents,
paperwork, immigration, licenses and financial challenges.

AngelList
AngelList is a platform that connects anyone who is passionate
about the startup industry. It provides a place for startups, angel
investors and job-seekers to achieve their dreams of improving the
world through social entrepreneurship. In addition, the platform
offers information regarding trends in startup industry, market
data, salaries, valuations, incubators and college alumni statistics.
Key Insights
• LinkedIn forStartups: One-Stop Platform to connect everything
for entrepreneurs, investors, job seekers and researchers.
• Small to Big Investments: Open to small investments starting
from $1,000 and allows startups to raise funding from angel
investors free of charge.
• Network Service: Connect to trustworthy investors and partners
who have similar goals by viewing their past activities. However,
messages only can be sent to people who you follow or you
are followed by.
• Alumni Connections: Easily find and contact alumni who are
actively engaging in the startup industry. i.e. Parsons School
of Design Startups: 144 Companies, 411 Alumni, and 35 Jobs.
• Smartphone App: Only provides AngelList updates including
announcements, funding and job opportunities.
“A platform where the world
meets startups.”

LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a leading business-oriented platform that connects
qualified professionals with companies. Since it launched in
2003, LinkedIn attracted more than 364 million members in over
200 countries and territories as of January 2015. Furthermore,
there are over 39 million students and recent college graduates on
LinkedIn and they are LinkedIn’s fastest-growing demographic,
according to the LinkedIn Newsroom.
More importantly, LinkedIn recently acquired Lynda.com for $1.5
billion which is the fourth-largest deal in social media history.
According to the CIO, this acquisition tops the $1 billion Facebook
paid for Instagram and the $1.1 billion Yahoo paid for Tumblr.
• The acquisition is an important move for both LinkedIn and
Lynda.com because it connects people and also gives them
access to educational resources and professional development.
• LinkedIn is expected to nurture the new generation of
professionals by building a sustainable network in the long-term.
• This acquisition of the top educational platform is expected to
become a major turning point for LinkedIn’s future as a leading
educational platform targeting already successful professionals
by connecting people to opportunities.
LinkedIn Acquired Lynda.com
“I think the most interesting aspect of
this deal is that LinkedIn will be able to
directly attribute e-learning to career
opportunities and advancement.”
Source: Why LinkedIn spent big on Lynda.com by CIO
Key Insights

IDEO Design Kit
IDEO.org provides IDEO Design Kit online courses in partnership
with Acumen, a non-profit global venture fund using entrepreneurial
approaches to solve world poverty via micro finance. IDEO is a global
innovative design consulting firm that first developed the design
thinking methodology to challenge traditional solutions.
The IDEO Design Kit program offers 7-week free online courses for
those interested in learning about human-centered design. This
course is designed with a group-guided learning structure and
requires participants to form an offline team of two to six people.
In the past four rounds, over 56,000 individuals from 148 countries
that have already participated in the program.
• Online and Offline Integrated Education: Human-centered
design courses are all about collaboration. Guided by the online
supporting materials, team members collaborate together
in person to build actual solutions to world problems. After
forming teams, team members are required to meet each week
to learn the human-centered design process via reading and
workshop materials. The course provides a completely new
environment that fully integrates online and offline experiences
and that motivates students and enables team members to
learn from each other.
• Networking Opportunity: The course strongly encourages
participants to complete course materials as a group rather than
individually. If a participant is unsure of group formations, the
platform provides a function to find and contact other members
nearby via an inbox service. Furthermore, participants have the
opportunity to share learnings and solutions, ask questions and
get to know other course participants from around the world via
an online community hosted on NovoEd.
• High Quality Materials: High-quality supporting material are
used throughout the course which are created by the Stanford
d.school and IDEO. In addition to high quality material from
IDEO and the Stanford d.school, interactive video clips recorded
by renowned innovative leaders give tips to tackle issues that
entrepreneurs may face during the entire process.
Key Insights

Meetup
Meetup is an online social networking portal that facilitates offline
group meetings in various localities around the world. Meetup
makes it easy for anyone to organize a local group or find one of
the thousands already meeting up face-to-face.
• Networking: Bring people together who have similar interests.
• Familiar User Interface: Overall function and UI are similar to
the Facebook event feature.
• Easy Communication: Contact members in the same group via
Meetup inbox.
• Easy Access: Users can easily find groups and events by simply
entering a zipcode.
• Business Model: Meetup receives revenue by charging fees
to administrators of groups, currently at $9.99 to $14.99 per
month depending on the payment plan.
Key Insights
Users enter their postal code or their city and the topic they want
to meet about, and the website helps them arrange a place and
time to meet. As of May 2015, the company claimed that it has
21.59 million members in 181 countries. There are 200,357 groups
and 555,116 monthly meetups.

General
Assembly
General Assembly is an educational institution that transforms
ideators into innovators through education in technology, business
and design at fourteen campuses across four continents. It was
established in 2011 as an innovative community for entrepreneurs
and startup companies.
Now it offers various types of online and offline courses including
12-week full-time and part-time boot-camp style courses as well
as various workshops and networking events. Topics range from
learning digital design (including web development, user experience
design, product design) to digital marketing and business skills in all
levels from beginner to expert.
• Long-term Support: General Assembly also offers various
resources and opportunities for community members to
further grow.
• Corporate Digital Training Program: Offers online and offline
education for executives, marketers and sales teams to boost
their ability in the digital age. Topics include digital marketing,
half-day field study workshops, and product management in
the digital age.
• Hiring Platform: Offers a personalized portfolio space
for graduates from General Assembly to post their skills,
specialties, work experience and education. Recruiters in the
digital industry can explore and connect with graduates from
General Assembly free of charge.
• Become an Instructor: By actively recruiting both part-time
and full-time instructors with relevant educational training,
General Assembly efficiently sustains a group of community
members and utilizes existing talent.
Key Insights

What We
Envision
Building upon our insights and the discoveries we
made through the interviews, journey maps, an in-depth
study of the competitive landscape, and prototyping
we have been able to validate our assumptions and
nail down the job-to-be-done. On one hand, students
pursuing entrepreneurship and innovation on an
academic level with ideas they want to develop into
businesses, need guidance beyond what they get in
classrooms, and on the other, international students
who are a majority here at Parsons need special and
centralized assistance with legal matters to pursue
entrepreneurship in the US.

We need access to a collaborative
space where we can take our
ideas beyond the prototyping
phase - a platform where we
can grow our networks, receive
personalized mentorship and
legal advice, learn about funding
opportunities and programs that
provide extensive experiential
learning, and find resources to
help us bridge the gaps in areas
requiring special skills such as
business, design, prototyping and
technical support.
Smoke Test
Vision Statement
OUR USERS
Parsons students
on the path of
entrepreneurship
VISION
A collaborative
space, where students
can grow their network,
receive personalized
mentorship and gain
easy centralized access
to all the resources that
will help bring their
ideas to life.
JOB-TO-BE-DONE
Turn ideas into solutions
INSIGHT
Today, students at
Parsons do not feel
they have the required
mentorship, guidance
and resources to bring
their ideas to life.

Let’s
Collaborate
One thing that seems to remain relatively stable even in times of
great change is human behavior. When analyzing our job-to-be-done
and its solution, we noticed that it is a system-level problem where
the system here is The New School. A problem like this is difficult to
solve when taking into account the institution’s size. According to
Managing Change by Design, “The reason for this is simple: although
most systems have evolved over time from something small and
simple to something larger and more complex, their growth has not
typically been managed in a holistic way.” The design of the system is
across multiple individuals or groups where their efforts have been
localized in their “bubbles” hence resulting in silos that are hard to
bring together, perpetuating the lack of a collaborative mindset. Us,
as designers, through human centered design and research, believe
through our solution, we will piece together these silos for the end
users. The solution framework we are proposing brings forth
this holistic viewpoint and refocuses on the School’s reason for
being which is the students and their needs, which is why we are
illuminating the difficulties and problems of our existing system.
“Finding ways to connect with people
and institutions possessing new
knowledge becomes increasingly
important. Since there are far
more smart people outside any one
organization than inside, gaining
access to the most useful knowledge
flows requires reaching beyond the
four walls of any enterprise.”– John Hagel

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The
E-Mentor
E-Mentor is a personalized online platform and mobile
application that can provide Parson’s students with
all the information, advice and resources, they need
to bring their ideas to life. Based on their majors
and legal status in the US the app will customize the
relevant data for each student from day 1, so they can
start making connections and building their network,
get mentorship, learn about policies and regulations
related to immigration and entrepreneurship, find
programs and workshops that compliment their
academic courses with experiential learning and that
they can benefit from early-on, and last but not least
gain access to funding opportunities and a rich and
centralized pool of technical resources and support.

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SEBEK, ANEZKA
Specialty: Design technology, Design
research, and interface design
Number of Mentees: 4/5Mentorship My AccountChat RoomFavorites Home
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GODELNIK, RAZ
Specialty: Innovation, Sustainability,
Business and Design strategies
Number of Mentees: 3/5
ARAKJI, REINA
Specialty: Innovation Strategy
POBINER, SCOTT
Specialty: Design technology, Design
research, and interface design
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Strategic Design
Strategic Design and Management
Abouhosn, Sara M.S.
Karageuzaian, Roupen M.S.
Karam, Nancy M.S.
Kang, Joonsoo M.S.
Morton, Jack B.F.A.
Tyson, Laura B.F.A
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Tyson, Laura B.F.A
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The E-Mentor BlogOnline Platform

Network
A culture of collaboration,
sharing and networking
A culture of collaboration is an essential and integral part of any
successful entrepreneurial ecosystem that fuels innovation and
leads to valuable breakthroughs. However at Parsons, and at odds
with what it teaches, within the school itself this culture is not yet
well established and only limited to small clusters of students and
professors that are as scattered and disconnected as the school’s
actual physical locations. A solid network of students, faculty and
alumni is absent, both on a social and a professional level, putting
us at a big disadvantage compared to other schools like NYU
where the focus on networking is impressive and empowering.
Through the E-Mentor we aim to enhance the collaborative
experience by building a strong networking engine where students
can have access to an extensive pool of contacts to add to their
circle, stay updated on events and make lasting connections
Mentorship
One-on-one support from
successful professionals
Another form of support that is lacking at Parsons and that the
students could benefit from immensely is mentorship. Mentoring
programs have proven to be the most powerful and effective
strategy for professional development within organizations as
well as on an individual level. Providing powerful role models that
students can look-up to and refer to for one-on-one advice will be a
great added value for the school and even more so for the students
helping them overcome personal, academic and professional
challenges in their pursuit of entrepreneurship and innovation.
Mentors can be recruited from Parsons circle of alumni and
instructors, as well as senior professionals associated with the
school’s network, and through our platform paired up with
mentees based on expertise.

Legal Advice
Policies and regulations
related to immigration and
entrepreneurship
When it comes to regulations, policies and paperwork most people
are clueless and without legal advice or expert help, navigating
through such processes and requirement is almost impossible, let
alone if you are an international student in a country with strict
regulations like the US. This has proved to be a major obstacle
for Parson’s students on the path of entrepreneurship in general
and an even bigger setback for international students wishing to
establish startups in New York and the US. ‘International Student
and Scholar Services’ are taking the lead on providing immigration
advice for internationals but still such resources are not well
centralized or comprehensive enough especially when it comes to
employment and entrepreneurship in particular.
As such, through E-Mentor, our aim is to provide students with
adequate legal support and give them easy access to legal
advisors that can guide them through all matters related to their
immigration and business plans, as well as a centralized and
extensive library of all existing data covering such issues.
Funding is another big obstacle that students face on their
entrepreneurial journey. Most of us don’t know where to start and
the school can play a big facilitating role to help its young army of
innovators make it to the finish line by:
1. Establishing and providing funding opportunities through
special school led funds, scholarships, and challenges
2. Providing loan facilities
3. Exposing outstanding initiatives to VCs, facilitating contact
with them, and helping students develop pitching skills
4. Partnering with platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo to
offer students maximum exposure
All these resources will be consolidated through the E-Mentor
allowing students to easily find what they are looking for and get
the advice they need.
Funding
Opportunities
for financing ventures

Learning by Doing
Hands-on skills development
and experiential training
Again it is important to stress that
having all these resources in one
place, instead of having to look for
them across various platforms and
announcements as is the case right
now, will greatly enhance the student
experience at Parsons, insure that
the schools efforts are seen and well
targeted and increase participation,
engagement and collaboration.
As discussed earlier, experiential learning has become an essential
part of the learning process that allows students to acquire the
job-specific technical expertise they need to startup their own
business. So to compliment academic studies, the school can offer
further opportunities to develop the necessary hands-on skills by
offering extra curricular programs where students can engage in
real-life projects and gain an in-depth understanding of the various
stages of developing a business. These ‘boot camps’ will provide
the rigorous training needed to prepare young entrepreneurs to
face the challenges of venturing into the world of start-ups. In
addition, the platform will update its users on ongoing workshops
and seminars as well as internship and job opportunities.

Bridging the Gap
A centralized database
of useful resources
Again using the collected insights and pain-points that students
face when trying to develop their business ideas, we made a list of
the resources that everyone agrees are missing links that create
obstacles and slow down progress. Those with design backgrounds
require assistance with business planning, marketing and finance,
and the other way around. Prototyping and technical support
are also integral to the process and not easy to navigate through
- finding the right supplies and services is always a dilemma
especially when you’re in a foreign environment. So to help bridge
the gaps the platform will provide access to all these resources
by helping students find fellow collaborators with the required
skills, providing them with locations of suppliers around the city as
well as online tools and tutorials, and giving them access to a rich
library of previous work done by Parsons students that they can
reference and learn from.
Also leveraging a network of expert vendors to support the
development of business ideas can be a great added value. This can
work in a variety of ways, such as including references in proposals,
getting pitch support, preparing custom surveys, and conducting
phone interviews, all in the goal towards better understanding the
different industries. Examples of companies that can be partnered
with are: AlphaSights, Atheneum Partners, Cognolink, Coleman RG,
Gerson Lehrman Group (GLG), Guidepoint Global, and Insight Alpha.

Incentives
Viable solutions are ones that are capable of existing, developing
and growing when conditions are favorable. Given that some of
the programs are new, it is only normal for discrepancies between
demand and supply to exist. It is however indispensable to start
with a holistic solution that is culturally engraved early on because
every day after the start is an opportunity to gather data, build
upon a network and grow. Students, faculty and alumni are the
success of the school.
One of the key performance indicators for many of the Graduate
Schools is the number of successful startups that come to life from
their own. It is what they pride themselves with and how they
market their programs to recruit the best talent, especially the
top, up and coming entrepreneurs who are looking for mentorship
and guidance. This is one of the main indicators that reflects the
school’s success and it is therefore everyone’s incentive to work
collectively towards this goal.
Beyond existing and growing in its own environment, a successful
solution is also one that can develop in other contexts. When
proven successful in the New School, the E-Mentor platform can
easily either merge or be rebranded and sold to other institutions.
Revenues lie both in the system itself and the riches of data that
can be curated based on the context. The platform is in its very
nature scalable and becomes exponentially more valuable with
each passing day. Therefore, the possibility to either merge with
and/or sell to other institutions sets the limits that much higher.
Many graduates feel disconnected from their alma mater once
they graduate. A few alumni events, newsletters, e-mails and the
occasional interactions make for shallow relationships that add
little value to both parties. Having the E-Mentor from the very
first day is a powerful tool to stay connected throughout Graduate
studies and beyond to grow the network post graduation.
In a data driven world, Data collection for the university is of
immeasurable value. The eLibrary feature for instance is one such
database of riches; it will hold a diversified portfolio of sanitized
decks, frameworks, best practices - all within reach of a search
query - this would in many instances save months of work not to
mention a plentitude of quality in house resources.
Our innovation is incremental
but one that can create many
radical innovations.

Taking
the Lead
Beyond Parsons, we are part of The New School’s creative
environment, exposed to the different disciplines and talents, who
practice to design innovative solutions for the future, along with
peers from other programs. We are members of The New School
in New York, we are citizens of the world’s most culturally diverse
community, at the center of the quintessential Metropolis. This is
by excellence the place to produce change, to make a real impact.
We are working towards building a lifetime global
network of thought leaders and innovators, and
interacting with a pool of talented colleagues and
mentors. Our school has a plethora of valuable
partners, Alumni, supporters, and advocates. It is
through these connections that we will excel. These
are the experiences that will ignite the artistic,
academic and professional senses within us, enabling
us to speak the business language of global brand
leaders and successfully communicating our ideas to
lead the innovation process and become the change
makers of the world.
“We are members ofThe New School in NewYork, we are citizens
of the world’s most culturally diverse community, at the center
of the quintessential Metropolis. This is by excellence the place
to produce change, to make a real impact.”

The Team
Karageuzian, Roupen
As a senior consultant of the consumer & retail practice in
Strategy& (formerly Booz & Co.), Roupen has contributed
to many projects across a diverse track of clients, including
both multinational and regional conglomerates. Learning
the Parsons design thinking method, he aspires to expand
his family business, a prominent shirt manufacturing and
wholesaling enterprise in the Middle East.
Ismail, Hussein
Now being at the transitional point between the first and
second year of an MFA in Design & Technology, the prior
experience was being a CSR specialist and a travel counselor
before that in Egypt. Looking forward to be involved more in
human centered design and socially innovative projects.
Kang, Joonsoo
Prior to making his big move to New York City, Joonsoo was a
PR and creative design specialist at Burson-Marsteller, a global
public relations and communications firm. He handled various
corporate communication activities like PR, digital marketing
strategy and design for various multinational corporations
including the Ford Motor Company, FedEx, HP, LG and the Walt
Disney Company.
Aboulhosn, Sara
Prior to pursuing her Masters in Strategic Design & Management
at Parsons, Sara worked at M&C Saatchi Lebanon as a senior
Brand designer focusing on bringing high profile brands to
life. Her experience spans from retail, editorial, corporate and
television branding. Prior to that, Sara worked as a Brand
Strategist at FITCH Doha where she bridged the gap between
design and strategy. Passionate about design and its power to
influence human behavior and driven by curiosity and the need
to continuously learn and evolve.
Karam, Nancy
Nancy is an upbeat brand and visual communication designer,
currently pursuing her graduate degree in Strategic Design
and Management at The New School. While working for
international agencies like WonderEight, Leo Burnett, and M&C
Saatchi over the past 12 years, she helped create, design and
reshape a rich and diverse portfolio of brands. As a next step
she’s hoping to finally follow her longing and focus on well-
being to help people redesign and transforms their lives.

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