Courses

This business basics course covers how to make a product or service idea real in the form of a tangible, marketable product and an organization that can produce and distribute it.  Topic areas covered include:  motivation and social purpose of entrepreneurship, market research and product development activities, people resource management, capital resources management, and go-to-market management.

Introduction to Entrepreneurship — Introduction to Entrepreneurship is designed for all freshman, sophomores and juniors, including non-business students, who wish to learn about entrepreneurship, its role and importance in our society, and how to bring new ideas to marketplace both in the startup and corporate setting. This is an introductory course intended to provide students with a solid foundation on how entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship play a key role in the 21st century global economy.

In the course, we will assess, explore, and critique the world of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is approached as a way of thinking and acting, as an attitude and a behavior. Our emphasis is on entrepreneurship as a process that can be applied in virtually any organizational setting.

The principle focus will be on the creation of new ventures, the ways that they come into being, and factors associated with their success. This is a course of many ideas and questions, and you will be encouraged to develop and defend your own set of conclusions regarding each of these issues. This course mixes theory with practice, and you will be challenged to apply principles, concepts and frameworks to real world situations.

Students will critically evaluate technologies and assume the role of ethical innovators and leaders to examine how technologies intersect with social equity, ethical design, and systemic change. Theories, including surveillance capitalism, algorithmic bias, and the socio-cultural dynamics shaping technology, will result in students developing strategies to promote responsible tech innovation.

Social Impact by Design introduces students to the core principles of social innovation methodology, applying creative, iterative problem-solving to address complex social challenges. Grounded in human-centered design, behavioral design, lean startup methods, and systems thinking, this course equips students with the critical thinking skills and practical tools needed to develop, test, and refine impactful solutions.

This course explores the relation between creativity, innovation, and problem-solving processes. We will consider the elements of creative thinking, explore insights from a variety of perspectives, and engage in projects designed to foster students’ own creativity and innovation. Is creative thinking somehow different from “normal” thinking? How do innovators frame problems and generate solutions? What is the relation between idea generation and collaborative team work? How do entrepreneurs in business, social goods, and technology develop and employ vital skills in persuasion, cooperation, communication as they bring ideas to life in the form of enterprises? This course will explore all these questions in order to ground students in both the theory and practice of creativity as it takes shape in entrepreneurial endeavors.

Please note: This course will no longer be offered starting Fall 2025. If you plan to declare the minor and have not yet completed this course, you will need to substitute it with 3 additional credits of approved practicum coursework.

Base of the Pyramid: Business Innovation and Social Impact --- Business can, and indeed must, play a greater role in responding to society's grand challenges. The deep poverty faced by the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) - the 4-5 billion poorest people on this planet and constituting approximately two-thirds of humanity - presents a challenge on the grandest scale. While donation-based approaches have their place, the promise of achieving both profits and social impact through market-based approaches offers an exciting alternative. Business opportunities in health care, energy, agriculture, sanitation, housing, education, consumer goods, clean water and other impact areas can lead to a more inclusive capitalism. The challenge is to build enterprises that are sustainable at scale in an impoverished and unfamiliar market context. The course integrates concepts of strategy, international business, entrepreneurship, non-profit management, and development to stimulate the leadership skills and competitive imagination needed to design, pilot, and scale BoP enterprises. Emphasizing action-based learning and using carefully selected cases, readings, videos, and outside guests, class sessions focus on: 1)identifying the opportunities and challenges associated with serving BoP markets; and 2) developing a toolkit of strategies, frameworks, and processes for building sustainable, scalable enterprises that create economic and social value.
 

In today’s rapidly evolving global market, characterized by significant product-market and technological changes, organizations must be agile and entrepreneurial to succeed. Achieving success often relies on technology-driven competition. This course aims to equip you with the skills to think strategically about technological innovation and understand how organizations effectively develop and deploy new products developments.

In this introductory course students will become familiar with product development, the prototyping of IoT hardware and software solutions, and the process of ‘whiteboarding’ ideas to life through the development of a final project.

This introductory course is designed to provide students with comprehensive instruction and practical, hands-on experience in a variety of fabrication techniques and tools. Participants will explore the fundamentals of 3D printing, laser cutting, CNC milling, 3D scanning, and computer-aided design (CAD). Through guided exercises and projects, students will develop the skills necessary to bring their designs from concept to physical creation, preparing them to work confidently with modern manufacturing technologies.

Turn your ideas into a real e-commerce business! In this hands-on course, you’ll work in teams to create a fully functional online store while learning the essentials—business setup, customer targeting, SEO, social media strategy, sourcing, and fulfillment. Through case studies, guest speakers, and interactive exercises, you’ll gain real-world insights and leave with a business you built yourself. 

Improve your odds of starting a viable business in this course through the introduction of a framework that will help you design and pitch a new product or service to sell to a customer in a start-up like environment.

This course provides students with an in-depth understanding of how business, design, and engineering skillsets must come together in the process of designing, building, and launching new products that can succeed in the market. Whether leading new product development in a large corporation or exploring new start-up opportunities, mastering the innovation process and taking a product-driven mindset is critical for the growth and success of product leaders.

** This is a special topics course and only Product Design counts toward the ideation requirement.

Graphic design brings words and images together to communicate ideas, experiences, and information. This class introduces students to basic graphic design skills through lectures, demonstrations, team exercises, and a series of individually assigned projects. Students work with Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, and Acrobat, and they experience the design process from conception to final execution. This class is intended for students who are curious about graphic design; no prior art experience is necessary.

Students learn the jewelry and metalsmithing techniques to create their own jewelry and small metal objects. Designing, sawing, piercing, soldering, forming, stone setting and finishing are covered in this course. Emphasis is placed on mastering craft, solving problems, and developing innovative designs. Students will have 24-hour access to the studio and will need to work outside of class to complete the course work.

This short course guides students through the basics of design prototyping and concept visualization. It is intended for students who do not typically engage in hands-on making as part of their major area of study. Topics covered include using accessible materials like paper, chipboard, foam core, and found objects to build models that are tangible representations of concepts for new designs. Simple drawing techniques for visualizing and communicating ideas under development will also be demonstrated. Students will learn a variety of prototyping approaches and techniques ranging from the quick and dirty (useful for the brainstorming stage) to more precise and sophisticated (best for final design presentation). The course focuses on building models of existing design concepts rather than on developing new concepts.

This short course introduces students to basic woodworking tools and techniques. It is intended for students who do not typically engage in hands-on making as part of their major area of study. Students will learn to build objects with wood and gain the basic skills needed to be able to complete simple wood fabrication projects with confidence. This course will compliment studies in other fields, provide technical support and resources, and encourage continued development beyond the classroom. Tools and materials will be provided.

This short course introduces students to basic metal fabrication tools and techniques. It is intended for students who do not typically engage in hands-on making as part of their major area of study. Students will learn to build objects with metal and gain the basic skills needed to be able to complete simple metal fabrication projects with confidence. This course will compliment studies in other fields, provide technical support and resources, and encourage continued development beyond the classroom. Tools and materials will be provided.

This course offers a gateway to the discipline of product/industrial design with an introduction to its history, cultural significance, and social importance. Through a series of projects students learn the key components of product development and manufacturing including design research, human factors, design methodology, materials and processes, and form and object appearance.

A survey of professional opportunities in performing arts management, the recording industry and arts entrepreneurship, with a focus on building business skills for the personal development of a career in music.

Students will learn basic skills that may serve any of the Business of Music areas of concentration: leadership, planning, budgeting, financial analysis, marketing, fund-raising and development (and/or seeking investors). Assignments will include: analysis of case studies, writing a grant proposal, and working in teams to create a model arts enterprise that will need a business plan and marketing materials. The course also features a number of guests from various businesses and music disciplines. Qualifies for Upper Level Writing Requirement.

Technological advances in business communication continue to evolve. Social media has forced past favorites to recreate themselves into new formats while new social media companies penetrated existing markets and businesses. Social media has transformed internal and external business communication, such that it is becoming more democratic, open, and participatory than ever before. All of these changes have been happening at a speed previously unforeseen in business communication. Businesses that have been slow to adapt are finding that their business practices are quickly becoming inefficient and outdated. This course will teach students about the rapidly changing landscape in social media to enable them to adapt to contemporary business communication challenges. The course will be broken down into three parts.

The first part of the course will provide students with the background necessary to understand the key concepts covered in the course. This background section will first provide students with a historical perspective of technological changes relevant to business communication. In addition, students will be provided with an overview of key business communication principles.

The second part of the course will provide an overview of the contemporary digital communication channels that are currently being used by corporations. In addition to examining current usage trends, each channel will be examined in terms of its strengths and potential pitfalls. Furthermore, students will be instructed on how to select the most appropriate message structure, delivery strategy, and argument support for the channel.

The third part of the course will review the “new rules” of business in the era of social media and their implications for business communication. This section also covers how to organize and display ideas in forms (e.g., images, videos, and infographics) most effective on social media.

It is essential for future business leaders and entrepreneurs to have an understanding of the role of the law and legal risk in shaping business decisions, achieving competitive advantage, and avoiding legal pitfalls. This course provides an introduction to the Anglo-American legal system and the development of substantive and procedural law with emphasis on the idea that business relationships are based upon contractual agreements. The course covers numerous pertinent business laws and regulations that shape business activities, including common law contracts, the Uniform Commercial Code (sales and leases), tort law (including negligence and products liability), international business transactions, environmental law, intellectual property law, jurisdiction, constitutional law, accountants legal liability, criminal law, and the relationship between law and ethics. Legal cases are studied to trace the development of the common law and to illustrate actual business problems that business professionals will encounter throughout their careers.

COMM 261 or COMM 281 strongly recommended. May not be repeated for credit.

This course investigates the changes in business, technology, and design that are reshaping the words and images, the form and content of persuasive mass communication. It investigates emerging strategies for reaching global and regional audiences, discusses the impact of new technologies and media convergence, and examines the social and ethical issues that underlie persuasive strategies.

Choreography and production of one solo and one group work for presentation in a thesis concert. 

Prerequisite: DANCE 372. Dance majors only; instructor permission required; typically offered Winter

*pre-requisite: ECON 401*

** NOTE: The only section that counts toward the minor is Econ of Entrepreneurship. 

This course will apply insights from economic theory to the practice of starting a new business or expanding a current business. The course will combine elements of strategy, marketing, and entrepreneurial finance courses as typically taught in a business school and an industrial organization class as taught in an economics department. We start by examining general issues regarding entrepreneurship, in particular the search for markets that can support entrepreneurial profits. The next section turns to specific strategic decisions that entrepreneurs make: pricing, advertising, product location, deterring entry by competitors, etc. The last section examines practical issues in entrepreneurship, e.g., finding capital, business plans, and patent protection.

*pre-requisite: Computer Science CoE/LSA, senior standing and EECS 281 and 370*

Third Century Initiative Classification: Creativity and Innovation
The use of mobile technologies is fast becoming integral to lives of individuals and groups across the planet. In this course, working in teams, students will propose, design, develop, test, and market software for mobile devices. Not only will best practices for mobile software development be learned, but best practices for entrepreneurs will also be learned. As well, students will put their creations up for sale/distribution by uploading their apps to the appropriate market place.

This course covers the fundamentals of patents for engineers. The first part of the course focuses on the rules and codes that govern patent prosecution, and the second part focuses on claim drafting and amendment writing. Other topics include litigation, ethics and licensing.

This course provides students with a perspective in looking to form or join startup companies and those that are looking to create corporate value via industrial research.  The students are taught the entrepreneurial business development screening tools necessary to translate opportunities into businesses with focus on:  strategy, finance, and market positioning.

*pre-requisite: senior/grad standing*

The course teaches the students how to screen venture opportunities in various cleantech domains.  Venture assessments are approached through strategic, financial and market screens, and consider the impact of policy and regulatory constraints on the business opportunity.

This course goals are to help students enhance their problem solving, critical thinking, creative thinking, and troubleshooting skills and to ease the transition from college to the workplace.  The course includes a few speakers from industry.  Students work in teams to complete the home problems and the term project.

Third Century Initiative Classification: Entrepreneurial Mindset

Four aspects of starting high-tech companies are discussed: opportunity and strategy, creating new ventures, functional development and growth and financing. Also, student groups work on reviewing business books, case studies, elevator and investor pitches. Different financing models are covered, including angel or VC funding and small business (SBIR) funding.

This course offers a comprehensive introduction to the multifaceted domain of space technology and its intersection with business and regulatory aspects. Tailored for non-technical students, the course provides foundational knowledge in key areas of space technology fundamentals, economics, venture capital models, and regulatory frameworks.

Step into the world of digital product design! In this hands-on course, you’ll go from idea to prototype, using industry-standard software to create and refine digital products. Working like a real tech team, you’ll master UX/UI design, apply user feedback, and make smarter design decisions. With guest speakers, case studies, and guided workshops, you’ll build a portfolio-ready final project.

*Can only be used once toward the minor

This weekly seminar series invites disruptive, influential, and respected entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and business leaders to speak to students about their personal experiences founding, financing, and managing a startup venture. Following the lecture, students will be able to meet the guest speaker and network with members of the entrepreneurial community.

Inventors and entrepreneurs have four concerns related to patent law: protecting inventions during product development, determining invention patentability, avoiding infringement, and leveraging a patent as a business asset. This course addresses these concerns through the application of case law and business cases to an invention of the student’s choice.

Successful entrepreneurship and early stage venture capital appear to require a mixture of four very different traits and abilities: innovation/vision, evaluation, operation/management, and dedication. This course dives deep into these four pillars of success for the next generation of entrepreneurs and venture capitalists.

Junior standing or above.

This course presents a pragmatic approach to marketing for new ventures. The course examines general marketing terms and principles, including the nature, dynamics, and strategies of marketing decision for new ventures. Students will apply these concepts to situations and problems relating to real ventures.

This class is a complimentary, graded discussion group to ENTR 407. In this one-credit course, students will learn about, discuss and debate the key characteristics of entrepreneurship and learn how to apply it to their own life goals. A brief weekly assignment is required.

How do entrepreneurs balance profit and responsibility? In this course, you’ll tackle real-world ethical challenges through case studies, media analysis, and team projects. Explore how decisions shape company culture, communities, and the world—while building the skills to lead with integrity in your own ventures.

This action-packed course will propel you into the heart of building and managing a world-class team! Unleash your leadership potential as we uncover the secret formula to identify and prioritize the perfect “who” – your human resource capital, the essential “what” – the skill sets required, and the crucial “why” – the driving force behind your venture’s growth and success!

Creating something from nothing starts with a story—a narrative about a problem, why it matters, and how you’ll solve it. Storytelling conveys your idea’s value, inspiring customers, investors, and employees. This class will teach you that great storytelling isn’t about flash, but about clarity, passion, and authenticity. Over seven weeks (March-April), you’ll learn to craft compelling stories that drive change.

Public policy embodies an assortment of value systems. While individual value systems express coherent, consistent approaches, public policy expresses an amalgam of values, with corresponding decrease in coherence/consistency. This course explores the relationships between various environmental values and public policy through analysis of policy issues at local, state, and national levels.

Students in this course reflect on and refine their own approach to environmental ethics through a close examination of a set of current environmental issues. They develop skills in detecting the value systems presently underlying public policy as expressed in laws, administrative regulations, and government action. Discussion and presentations by participants and by outside speakers who are professionals in the field will give insight into the challenges of meeting stakeholder expectations and forging a coherent, effective approach to environmental challenges. Issues such as water protection/preservation in the Great Lakes Basin, the sustainability and survivability of endangered species, the management of wildlife in rural, suburban, and urban areas, and formulation of energy policy will provide the basis for investigation.

This course introduces students to business.  In this course we foster development of the key skill of learning via reflection on one’s own experience.  The course will rely heavily on examination of individual organizations or industries from which generalizations can be made.  Specific situations will be selected to convey the excitement of business situations, the role of business in society and the global scope of business.  The primary purpose of this class is to educate students about the broad range of problems and opportunities that businesses face and the tools and skills that are necessary to face them.  A secondary purpose is to show the students the richness of business activity by ‘peeling back the onion’ via case discussions of situations and companies they have experienced in their lives.  Students will gain familiarity with different kinds of information resources: from trade magazines to mass market books to research journals.

Entrepreneurship is about overcoming ambiguity, risk and failure, embracing it, and learning from it.  This course will explore entrepreneurship and identify and many contexts in which entrepreneurship manifests, including start-up, corporate, social, and public sector.  It will prepare students for starting and succeeding in an entrepreneurial venture.  The main course deliverable is a complete business plan and a presentation to an outside group of investors.

This course will enable participants to sharpen their ability to find and evaluate opportunities for a new venture, as well as to think creatively and solve problems in highly unstructured situations.  A broad range of topics essential to entrepreneurial ventures will be covered, including idea generation, feasibility analysis, raising capital, marketing strategies, financial modeling, attracting a capable team, creating a culture, and preparing for growth.  In addition, the course will cover buying a business, franchising, and family business.

This course explores the strategic, operating, financial, legal, family, career and business issues found in family-owned and managed companies or privately-held firms. The challenge of the course is to provide the tools to be successful, whether as part of a family business, work for one, or want to be a consultant to a family business.

Students participating in the course will: 1) Learn about opportunities to create and capture value in the health, wellness, and personal resiliency sectors. 2) Develop tools and methods to implement practices in their workplaces that contribute to wellness and resiliency among all employees. 3) Apply wellness tools and practices in their own lives.

Microfinance provides financial services to the poor, including credit, savings, and insurance. The field is undergoing a period of transition as microfinance institutions begin to seek money from capital markets. This course will explore how microfinance institutions are organized, how they raise money and are managed, and emerging trends that are shaping the field, all with an eye towards understanding the interplay between business models and poverty alleviation.

This course is open to all BBA students and Juniors + and presents the fundamentals of venture capital and private equity finance.  It is focused on financing startup and early stage, technology-based firms, later stage investment and buyouts.  The course covers venture capital and private equity market structure and institutional arrangements and the application of financial theory and methods in a venture capital and private equity setting.  Four main aspects of venture capital and private equity are covered:  valuation, deal structuring, governance, and harvesting.  “Live” case studies are used in demonstrate the practical, hands-on application of techniques following their development in class.

Application only, travel required

This Global Business Field Projects course investigates specific aspects of FinTech in depth. The course pairs with company sponsors to provide actionable solutions to problems these companies have in the FinTech area. The course is paired with two-one-week field visits to countries in which the sponsor companies have FinTech interests.

Processes of design, focusing on front-end strategies, including opportunity discovery, problem definition, developing robust mechanisms to gather information from users and other stakeholders, data synthesis methods for translating user data into design requirements, creating innovative solutions during concept generation, and decision-making systems for evaluating possible solutions.

Nearly $1 trillion is spent every year on the selling function. Every senior management team must deliver its revenue and profit numbers. As customer loyalties diminish and marketing channels proliferate, sales – once seen as a tactical adjunct to marketing – has increased its role to become the key interaction between company and customer. Today sales professionals must expand their perspective to see their role in an enterprise–wide, cross functional context. This course covers the basics of selling skills as well as the core sales management building blocks including organization, compensation/motivation, hiring, training, sales tools, process and leadership. The goal of the course is to show how integrating the sales function within the company’s strategic planning increases productivity and profits.

This course will familiarize students with principles of sales and marketing in a business to consumer space.  The course will provide an understanding of the sales function in a retail environment, with topics including sales training, consumer service, merchandizing, and the effective use of CRMs.  The course will also provide student an overview of managing retail businesses, ranging from the fast-paced cadence of daily goal-sitting, training, and performance reviews to the seasonality of specific marketplaces.  The course will include modules on overcoming the hurdles to success in such settings, such as high employee turnover and communicating and managing a diverse workforce.

Formulation of appropriate and effective marketing strategies must begin with a clean and accurate understanding of consumers.  This includes an understanding of consumer needs and wants, the process by which they are satisfied, and the environment in which the behavior occurs.  The objectives of the course are as follows:  (1) to introduce the student to concepts developed in psychology, economics, and sociology and their relationship to consumer behavior, (2) to involve the student directly in the study and analysis of consumer behavior, and (3) to develop in students the ability to translate what can be learned into marketing action implications.

This course introduces students to the challenges and complexities of business to business and industrial marketing. While many students are familiar with consumer marketing, few have an opportunity to understand foundational marketing principles applied in business to business contexts. Business to business transactions often require selling across multiple organizational levels and across departments to the complex and sophisticated decision making unit employing a more involved decision making process. The course framework and analytical tools will allow students to assess the complex and changing context of business to business marketing in a global economy, and apply course knowledge to synthesize strategic and tactical solutions that deliver value for business customers, stakeholders, and their own firms. The following business sectors are studied: industrial technology, software, eCommerce, chemical transportation, shipping, and agribusiness.

Technology has significantly transformed marketing. The last several years have seen an explosion of digital options to engage consumers and attract client marketing budgets. This course is designed for students who have taken marketing management. It will focus on the tools and techniques of digital marketing. We will explore such topics as search engine advertising, the effectiveness of banner ads, and how to use viral marketing, email marketing, and consumer-generated media. The approach is to bring a healthy dose of action-based learning into the classroom. Readings will include recent research, cases, and books on key industry trends. Grades will be based on team presentations built on a live project, as well as several one-page essays and classroom contributions.

This course is designed to focus on the new product development process which is key to the success of any organization. The course will expose students to (a) creative techniques for idea generation, (b) fine-tuning these ideas to develop products and services that meet specific consumer needs, and (c) testing the feasibility of these ideas.  The course uses lectures, cases, and outside speakers. Moreover, the course includes a project wherein student teams need to use the creativity techniques covered in this class to come up with new product ideas and perform a concept test to evaluate their feasibility. The course will be useful to students interested in product/brand management, management consulting, and entrepreneurship.

InterMissions - An Action-Learning Expedition --- InterMission is a self-leadership course for students adrift in a sea of expectations who are exceptional at fulfilling goals set by others but find themselves too busy to reflect on whether they're the right thing to do. The goal of the course is to help you authentically lead yourself and others -- every day, in ways large and small. To achieve this goal, InterMission explores personalized pursuits of coherence, purpose and significance in service of an impactful career. The course includes a one-week wilderness expedition in Utah's Canyonlands with the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS). The wilderness expedition is strenuous and has an incremental cost, for which scholarships are available to offset the course fee. The action-learning expedition is a capstone experience of the course, blending awe-inspiring landscapes with a unique leadership challenge, and an opportunity to integrate and apply course teachings. InterMission has 12 classroom sessions of 90 minutes each and 7 intensive days on the wilderness expedition, which runs at the conclusion of winter term before summer internships or post-graduation pursuits. The classroom sessions will utilize and apply rigorous, science-based frameworks and experiential formats developed at Harvard Business School, UPenn Wharton, Virginia's Darden School, UC Berkeley and Michigan Ross School. The frameworks will be further supported by practice, including self-tests and action-learning exercises. The learning and practice exercises culminate in a final assignment where students are tasked with passing on what they've learned. The course is taught in partnership with the Business+Impact Program and Sanger Leadership Center and builds upon the Ross Leadership Journey topics of self, interpersonal and team leadership. We will explore, in more depth with practice, areas such as values, purpose, crucible moments, feedback, and conflict resolution, that have been cited by students as leadership development priorities. You will be challenged to be more authentic, build purpose-centeredness, and improve teamwork and collaboration by embracing change and growth. The skills you cultivate will then be applied to when, how and with whom you want to make an impact. Modern movements of social justice, sustainability and the changing role of business in society demand these perspectives and skills. The course is taught by a Professor who has been a Peace Corps volunteer, corporate executive, social intrapreneur and current global sustainability leader.

This intensive course is designed to prepare undergraduates to understand and lead teams and organizations where people flourish. The word flourish captures people who are in an optimal state of human functioning, where they are both effective and healthy. The course exposes student to cutting edge research in the field of Positive Organizational Scholarship and provides intensive field experiences in work organizations interested in fostering human flourishing at work (and beyond). The course includes highly engaged learning experiences that challenge and build knowledge about how to make work organizations (and the people within them) better. The course is designed to be intensive and inspiring through exposure to foundational research, challenging and creative assignments, engagement with a variety of practitioners and a transformative classroom experience. The course is ideal for students who wish to make a positive difference in their workplaces and beyond.

Spring term only
*pre-requisite: instructor consent*

The Magnify Program is an immersion in Positive Organizational Scholarship knowledge, principles, and practices designed especially for undergraduates between their sophomore and junior years. Magnify offers a high-quality academic and real-world action learning experience in the Spring term. Participation in Magnify equips students with a new view of the latent potential in organizations and fuels them with motivation to become positive leaders and change agents.

Overall, this program aspires to build knowledge as well as provide students with opportunities for application, analysis, creativity, and critical thinking. Participation in Magnify will:

• Equip students with frameworks from positive organizational scholarship that build understanding in how to create and sustain organizations that strive for positive capabilities and provide contexts where people flourish. This is the focus of classroom learning activities.
• Create opportunities for students to apply frameworks in the field during a one-week intensive action learning experience in a partner organization
• Engage students in data gathering, coding, and analysis such that they can analyze their observations systemically and evaluate the potential for positive capabilities as well as existing strengths in their partner organization
• Require high-level, high-quality creative presentations to the partner organizations, which demand a high level of both application and analysis to reach conclusions that reflect back their insight and demonstrate their understanding of both current practices in the organization and possibilities for improving flourishing in the future by application of general knowledge, practices, and principles related to Positive Organizational Scholarship
• Create self-assessments and design a personal portfolio that reflects the relevance of ideas, principles, and practices of POS for one’s own flourishing.

*pre-requisite: BBA senior standing*

This course is designed to introduce the student to the practices necessary to stimulate and manage creativity in a business. Students will be given frameworks and methods for designing, developing, and implementing creativity in real work situations. The aim of the course is to provide students with the perspective and skill base necessary to manage creative projects, people and ventures.

Each class will consist of two basic components: 1) a theatrical framework, and 2) a methodology or tool. Each segment of the course is designed to engage the student in a conceptual and experiential application of creativity practices that will be applied to a real challenge.

This project-based class uses organizational sociology, psychology, economics, and political science to ask what good leadership is and how people can be effective when they lack formal authority. Practical exercises, academic readings, and leader profiles ground this exploration of collaborative leadership, a process with deep roots in Michigan organizational research.This class begins with idea that much important leadership takes place in situations that are neither highly visible nor characterized by the exercise of authority. Instead, understanding, evaluating, and exercising leadership requires attention to collaboration, social influence, and persuasion when potential leaders lack any ability to command the attention, respect, or effort of others. Such influence-based, collaborative processes are the primary mechanism for exercising leadership in civic, religious and voluntary organizations, mission-driven non- profit organizations, and among younger and entry level employees in multiple settings. In other words, the ideas and practices this course seeks to develop have wide ranging potential uses. We draw on a classical and contemporary social science to address three key questions about the process and practice of collaborative leadership. Those questions are: (1) What is good leadership? (2) Why do effective leaders often fail? (3) How can people and institutions improve the practice of leadership? Readings and exercises grounded in organizational approaches to sociology and psychology are leavened with ideas from economics and political science.We will integrate a rigorous academic introduction to the features and implications of collaborative leadership with more pragmatic work that develops skills students can use they pursue effective collaborations within and across multiple organizational settings. 

Organizational psychology is the subfield of psychology devoted to the study of human thought and action in organizations, and it aims at describing, explaining, predicting, and influencing the experiences and actions of people at work. This course offers a broad-ranging introduction to the field and aims to help students to develop understanding and practical skills related to managing behaviors in organizations. Topics covered in the course include, for instance, individual differences at work, motivation, stress and well-being at work, group dynamics, communication in organizations, culture in organizations, and leadership. The course will include both lectures and a discussion section session each week.

This discussion course attempts to define what we mean when we say, “creative.” What can scientific research tell us about creativity in terms of individual aptitude and personality, cognitive and brain processes, and social and cultural influences? We will explore the range of theories developed by psychologists and other researchers about the cognitive processes underlying the creative process, including problem definition, idea generation, fixation, incubation, iteration, evaluation, and reflection.

Printmaking (RC ARTS 287) focuses on printmaking as a means of visual inquiry and expression. Projects will direct students to create multiples as well as one-of-a-kind images using a variety of printmaking techniques (linocut, monotype and screenprint). The aim of the course is for students to acquire a rounded education including image development, conceptual growth, and technical skills via lectures, demonstrations, studio projects, discussions, and field trips to local exhibitions. The final goal is to empower the student to feel comfortable articulating his/her visual interests via the print medium, and to be able to make choices in that context from an informed standpoint.

Many students want to understand the roots of social problems, and they value this knowledge, at least in part, because they believe (correctly) that it can help them to become more effective in addressing these problems. Such students learn a great deal about the structural causes of social problems in our courses. Community service learning courses like Project Community (SOC 389), and programs like Semester in Detroit, give students who lack prior personal experience a powerful sense of the harm these structures do to people with whom they form relationships, and an equally strong motivation to do what they can to reduce these harms. But neither type of course teaches our students how to use social scientific knowledge to help make deliberate, positive changes to problematic social structures. The course will introduce students to community organizing.

This course is designed to help students develop historical perspectives and analytical frameworks that will guide them as they study and work in urban communities. Focusing on the collective experience of African Americans in the second half of the twentieth century, we will conduct an interdisciplinary investigation into the processes of community formation and social change impacting contemporary urban life. Course texts therefore include historical studies, urban sociology, social work, autobiography, ethnography, community studies, and film. We will begin with a review of the various meanings and uses of the idea of “community,” moving next to a brief consideration of the historical development of American cities. Then we will explore the processes of African American migration and urbanization, including the exploration of specific urban areas and their dynamics of community formation. Finally, we will examine case studies of community organizing, leading us to consider broad questions concerning our understanding of contemporary urban communities, the challenges they face, and the prospects for engaged social action. Our guiding concern throughout the semester will be the relationship between universities and their surrounding communities—including the historical expressions, contemporary realities, and future prospects of this relationship. This is the one required course for the Urban Studies minor.

This course provides students with foundational skills for understanding user behavior and experiences through qualitative research. The course covers methods such as interviews, observations, and thematic analysis. Students will learn how to collect, interpret, and apply qualitative data to inform user-centered design decisions. This hands-on course prepares students for optionally taking advanced research and evaluation in user experience design and information systems

This course looks at information's role in organizations, including psychological, economic, management, and sociocultural perspectives. Explores sense-making and effective communication, including the importance of "storytelling." Covers key humanistic perspectives and ethical issues related to information. Goes into the nature of requirements and helps students learn to "swim in a sea of data" in organizations. The course focuses on the importance of working at the frontier.

This course provides students with a strong theoretical foundation for approaching the ways in which new social media platforms can shape how interpersonal relationships are initiated, maintained, and developed, as well as the implications of these tools for psychological processes.
 

Social Influence is one of the most pervasive and powerful mechanisms for behavior change, whether you are an informatics professional who is building up your design toolbox, designing a new information system, or managing a team. In this course, we will learn why and under what conditions an individual's thoughts and actions can be influenced by those around them.
 

This course will address the technical, social, and psychological factors related to how organizations adopt and use social media technologies. Emphasis will be placed on how organizations can leverage social media to communicate with external stakeholders as well as support internal organizational processes such as collaboration, knowledge management, and innovation.

This course provides a hands-on approach to learning responsive, accessible front-end programming for Web Design. Topics covered include HTML5, CSS3 (including Bootstrap framework), JavaScript, and the POUR design principles of accessible design.
 

This course is an introduction to the field of games user experience (UX) theory and practice. This course will use cross-disciplinary readings, lectures, and resources to explore the industry practice of games user research and game design, and the academic field of games research. It satisfies an undergraduate elective.

This course explores the principles of designing intuitive and effective interfaces between humans and digital systems. The course emphasizes the psychological, social, physiological, and technical factors that influence user experience. Through hands-on design work, students will design and assess interactive systems, preparing them for advanced work in user experience design and development.

Students work with governmental departments and nonprofit agencies to conduct user research around an information need determined by their partner organization. Students work in teams to collect direct user data, using multiple UX research methods. The deliverable is a recommendations report supported by evidence to our partner organizations.

This course offers students a foundation in coding and software development with a focus on user experience design. The course covers key programming concepts, web technologies, and front-end development, introducing languages such as HTML5, MySQL, PHP, JavaScript, and Python. Students will learn to build interactive, user-friendly interfaces and understand the technical aspects of creating digital products. This course prepares students for more advanced work in user-centered design and development.

This course introduces tools and techniques for building user interfaces that are reactive and responsive. It covers a variety of design heuristics for creating interfaces that are usable and accessible. It also teaches software design patterns to implement user interfaces at scale.

This course introduces techniques to model user behavior from economic theory, behavioral economics, and computer science. Students learn to model preferences using observational and experimental data and evaluate the effectiveness of pricing and monetization strategies for digital products in the presence of network effects, changing digital advertising landscape, novel AI technologies, and privacy preferences. Student teams analyze case studies about user modeling in real-world companies.

This foundations course for the Community Action and Social Change Minor is designed to prepare students to be informed and active participants in the process of community building and social change. The course uses a multidisciplinary framework to develop competencies that will help students envision what community action and social change look like, identify and implement steps towards social change, build on positive sources of power, indigenous knowledge and experiences of individuals, groups, and communities who are engaged in social change efforts. The course is co-taught by a team representing different disciplinary perspectives who will work with student to integrate different ways of thinking based on the various disciplinary perspectives to achieve social change.

The course material covers theories and practices of community action and social change through an interdisciplinary examination of examples in research and practice. The course focuses on individuals, groups and institutions and how they interact. The course examines empirical quantitative and qualitative studies that test social change methods and provides exposure to and experience with qualitative research methods such as ethnographic observation and interviewing and qualitative data-gathering. Students are engaged in a critical and contrasting assessment of community organizing and other social change methods.

Principles and practices of stage management, including rehearsal coordination, prompt book preparation, and director/cast/crew relationships during rehearsal for theatre, opera, and musical theatre. Combines classroom instruction with practicum experience. Students assistant-stage manage a University Productions show during the semester; participate in rehearsals and performances.

Engages students in research and development of performance  projects at a local, community organization or at an international site. The class participates in fieldwork experiences and each individual submits a final project report or thesis at the end of their fieldwork. The Capstone course is collaborative and interdisciplinary and multiple faculty members can supervise and approve student work.

An overall look at the administrative aspects of the performing arts, using a Theatre company as the standard model, but with a look at orchestras, dance, and opera. Exploration of theatre development, profit vs. non-profit companies, role of board of directors, unions, budgeting, marketing, public relations, and fundraising. Instructor permission required.

*must be in the Living Arts living/learning community
*fulfills a First-Year Writing Requirement

UARTS 150 is designed to promote exploration of one’s own creative abilities through cross-disciplinary activities. The course work is organized around introductory lectures followed by related workshops with the aim to illuminate past and current creative minds and to provide a studio-like setting for related hands-on experimentation.

A team of four faculty members from four different U-M schools will work together with students to illustrate how thinking and working creatively produces greater productivity, accomplishment, meaning and richness to one’s academic, professional and personal life.

In particular, the course aims to:

• Demystify creativity and demonstrate it to be an inherent potential of all humans.
• Challenge common misconceptions of creativity: that it is only available to a select few “geniuses”.
• Assist students in developing a conceptual foundation for identifying creative approaches to arrive at their own creative process.
• Foster the ability to recognize creative potential in unexpected contexts and understand that creative expression in any filed is a process that can take many different forms.
• Provide a framework for students to reflect on the course work and then write about their reflections, thoughts and own conclusions.

Creative Process is a four-credit course that immerses students — first- year through fourth-year, from all units — in the creative process.  Team-taught by faculty from each of the North Campus units, CP provides students the opportunity to pursue intensive, hands-on creative work in four modalities — sound, motion, visual images and objects, and language — any or all of which come into play in their final course project.

The objective of Creative Process is to de-mystify creativity for students in all U-M units and years: to teach students that creativity is not a character trait or an event, but a process — one that will challenge their sense of competence and mastery, but that they can understand and eventually master, transforming both themselves and their work.

This course aims to address the gaps and misconceptions that often exist between feminism as an academic discourse and feminism in practice. Through classroom engagement and community involvement, students will explore the intersection of academia and activism as it pertains to working to improve the lives of women and their communities. Students will learn nonprofit management basics, think critically about community engagement, and explore the applicability of feminist practice to each. WOMENSTD 350 students commit to volunteering in an area community based organization, as well as to active participation in the classroom. Students will have the opportunity to dialogue with nonprofit organization founders and leaders from diverse backgrounds and learn about nonprofit management and community engagement from a variety of perspectives. Through readings, written assignments, classroom participation, and service experiences, this course endeavors to nurture and facilitate: critical thinking about community service, non-profit organizations, feminisms, and their relationships to social change; consideration of how feminist thought can be applied to work in communities and how communities can inform feminist thought; and the development of skills for working effectively within community based organizations and with communities around issues that affect women’s lives.

The Pedagogy of Empowerment will explore empowerment through race, gender, health and activism in the context of HIV/AIDS in United States Black communities. Through this two tiered course, students will cultivate strong background knowledge of HIV in Black communities, and explore issues of accountability, apathy, and activism as they pertain to HIV prevention. The course has three main objectives.The epidemiology of HIV as it affects African Americans and its many complexities — African Americans and homophobia, gender, racialism and health, and the persistence of HIV as an African American crisis. Students will use what they learn about the context of the epidemic to critically analyze chosen HIV prevention interventions, and explore the intersection of academia and activism.As a consequence of this analysis, everyone in this class must learn an oral HIV prevention module developed by Professor Haniff which must be taught to community groups outside of Ann Arbor. This activist component is the praxis of this class which requires students to not just read and study empowerment but to actually be engaged in an effort to empower. Students will also study innovative ideas that will generate insights in creating change and making a difference.

In this project-based class, students will respond to pressing social needs through design thinking processes, including visioning, concept generation, sketching ideas, everyday ethnography, creative experimentation, and extensive prototyping and validation. Students will form interdisciplinary teams to work on actual entrepreneurial design projects focused on food, education, health care and income issues facing our community partners. As part of the course, students acquire the theoretical frameworks and skills necessary for undertaking a social enterprise. They will then use those tools to design and develop their own ideas for aThe Entrepreneurship Practicum is an innovative, action-based learning lab led by the Center for Entrepreneurship that brings entrepreneurs across disciplines at the University to work on entrepreneurial endeavors. In this class, entrepreneurs form interdisciplinary teams and take steps to launch their own entrepreneurial ventures through a hands-on framework. You will learn to develop your entrepreneurial ideas and apply them into meaningful business models.

In this class, you will experience entrepreneurship firsthand though three progressive team projects. This framework teaches important skills of entrepreneurship, such as ideation, validation, and business models and culminate in the selection of a student-selected venture to validate and launch. You will understand and experience the mindset of an entrepreneur, develop the ability to share the story of your entrepreneurial pursuits, understand customer needs, make real sales to real customers, and validate business models.  venture that creates possibilities, products and systems in response to real world problems.

The music industry has undergone enormous changes fueled by both social and technological shifts. Still, entrepreneurs find brilliant new ways for users to interact with, experience, hear, and even see music. In this course led by a working music industry leader, participants will work in teams to learn about the business of the music industry today by working with other students to start and test music-oriented or related businesses. The course is structured in three phases:
1) music industry knowledge and case studies,
2) ideation and iteration, and
3) Heading to Market: Go or No Go?
By the end of the semester, student teams will be able to launch a minimum-viable product of a music oriented business, that is making sales, is testing market fit, and can look for further funding to grow. Supported by faculty mentoring, teams will assess opportunities, research potential customers, explore legal barriers, formulate and validate a business plan, and begin executing their plan to spread their business to the world.

This course offers students the opportunity to establish and lead a functional team in an actual, operational business unit, working directly with executives of a sponsoring company, and learning under the supervision of faculty advisors. Students accepted into this course will work as team members in one of several Ross enterprises that have been created for the purpose of experiential learning and the practical application of foundational knowledge in a real business setting.

Application only

Students will work with community partners to identify and refine needs, define opportunities, and prioritize needs to work on. They also may identify and document existing solutions and available community-based assets, generate user requirements and specifications related to community needs, and begin to generate initial concepts. The final deliverables for the course are a fieldwork plan presented at winter 2019 Design Expo and customized report for the partner organization that identifies priority design opportunities in their work.

*students may not do both ENTR 411 and ES 414

The Entrepreneurship Practicum is an innovative, action-based learning lab led by the Center for Entrepreneurship that brings entrepreneurs across disciplines at the University to work on entrepreneurial endeavors. In this class, entrepreneurs form interdisciplinary teams and take steps to launch them through a hands-on entrepreneurial framework.

In this class, you will experience entrepreneurship firsthand though three progressive team projects. This framework teaches important skills of entrepreneurship, such as ideation, validation, and business models and culminate in the selection of a student-selected venture to validate and launch. You will understand and experience the mindset of an entrepreneur, develop the ability to share the story of your entrepreneurial pursuits, understand customer needs, make real sales to real customers, and validate business models.

The Urban Entrepreneurship course is designed for students who want to learn how to make lasting improvements in urban quality-of-life throguh the creation of for-profit businesses. Urban communities can be vibrant, exciting, and highly productive places, but residents and visitors are often faced with an array of unique challenges. Governments, foundations, and not-for-profit companies have long been associated with efforts to make improvements, but in spite of those efforts, significant urban needs persist. Students in Urban Entrepreneurship course will explore the creation of sustainable, scalable, for-profit companies that address the needs of urban communities. Entrepreneurs have a long history of service to urban communities, and rapidly accelerating technology and knowledge in a variety of fields give rise to new business models for solving previously intractable problems.

In this course you will learn to analyze all aspects of a company, develop market intelligence, and provide advice that will reshape a company. This class is offered in collaboration with the U-M Economic Growth Institute, which has decades of experience providing strategic guidance to small- and medium-sized companies. You will be directly involved in gathering and interpreting data that will be used by real companies for high-level decision making as they reinvent the firm.

**Entrepreneurial Leadership is only available for students in the Entrepreneurial Leadership Program**  For more information on ELP please click here.

Perot Jain TechLab at Mcity: The dynamic application-based course propels students into the heart of innovation, immersing them in exhilarating project-based collaboration with pioneering startup companies. Unleash your potential in the transportation industry, working on cutting-edge technology and making a real impact.

IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCE BY APPLICATION ONLY. The application can be found here. 

• Semester 1 WN term 3 credits
• Semester 2 FA term, 3 credits
• Credits: 6 in total, graded

*Students using these courses toward minor requirements may split the 6 credits between practicum and elective credits. 

Students have the opportunity to enroll in a year-long immersive course centered around project-based learning. Throughout the course, you will engage in collaborative projects with companies dedicated to making substantial contributions to the planet’s carbon balance.

IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCE BY APPLICATION ONLY- The application can be found here . 

• Semester 1 WN term, 3 credits
• Semester 2 FA term, 3 credits
• Credits: 6 in total, graded

*Students using these courses toward minor requirements may split the 6 credits between practicum and elective credits. 

Engage in entrepreneurship through collaboration with startups focused on shaping the future of transportation electrification – including power electronics, micro-grids, batteries, metering, and complete vehicle systems. You can find the application here.

IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCE BY APPLICATION ONLY

• Semester 1 WN term 3 credits
• Semester 2 FA term, 3 credits
• Credits: 6 in total, graded

*Students using these courses toward minor requirements may split the 6 credits between practicum and elective credits. 

Step into the future of healthcare innovation and entrepreneurship. Here, you’ll collaborate with pioneering startups in the health tech industry to explore entrepreneurial opportunities. You can find the application here.

IMMERSIVE EXPERIENCE BY APPLICATION ONLY

• Semester 1 WN term 3 credits
• Semester 2 FA term, 3 credits
• Credits: 6 in total, graded

*Students using these courses toward minor requirements may split the 6 credits between practicum and elective credits. 

Entrepreneurial Action and Vision is only available for students in the Entrepreneurs Leadership Program**  For more information on ELP please click here

Gain hands-on experience understanding and working with the defense and intelligence communities to innovate at speed, working on current national security problems.

Link to Innovation for Impact: Defense and Security application can be found here.

This course will cover the concepts and practices of environmental sustainability as they pertain to the campus of this university. Students will design and conduct projects about managing this campus more sustainably than is currently practiced.

*Seniors only
***students may not do both ENTR 411 and ES 414

The Practicum enables students to gain first-hand entrepreneurial experience within a structured, supportive context. In addition to applying the knowledge you have acquired during previous courses, you will also learn – and put into practice – valuable new tools and techniques that can help you to successfully identify, assess, and pursue attractive business opportunities. During multiple team-based projects you will gain hands-on experience in a broad range of important entrepreneurial activities, including: Customer discovery, Solution ideation, Business model generation, Product development, Running “lean experiments,” Marketing & selling, and Entrepreneurial decision-making, among many others. 

Only the UX-Driven Entrepreneurship section of 311 counts toward the minor. Other sections are not eligible.

*Students are required to enroll in both TO 448 (Ross) and ARTDES 416 (STAMPS).

This course is a 6-credit, experiential, cross-disciplinary course for teams of Junior and Senior undergraduates from across the University. Market entry testing culminates their Human Centered Product Design project.