Provost's Innovation Student Fellowship 2020-21 Cohort

Provost's Innovation Student Fellowship
2020-21 Cohort

Twelve University of Oregon students make up the first cohort of the Provost’s Innovation Student Fellowship program, priming the university to expand its entrepreneurial ecosystem.

The fellows selected include every level of scholarship at the university--from undergraduates in their first year to PhD students—and span more than a dozen disciplines. Members of this cohort already have some experience with entrepreneurship, whether that be as a startup founder, as an intern with an accelerator or similar organization, or as a user of the university’s Innovation Partnership Services.

Lauren Babcock
Lauren Babcock
Planning, Public Policy and Management
"I would like to expand my development skills into the private sector, at the intersection of service and business, social entrepreneurship. I hope to bridge the gap between the private and public sectors to extend entrepreneurial resources to public service professionals, and combine the strengths of each sector to more effectively deliver social goods and services."
Mitchell Davey
Mitchell Davey
MM Music Composition
"I am deeply committed to highlighting the important issues our communities face, including social justice initiatives, climate change, health care, and violence, in my musical pursuits.  Moreover, I am dedicated to ethical entrepreneurship and fostering positive social change. Often times, student-run creative projects are forced to cease, largely due to unintentional lack of support from the greater university community. I seek to increase inter-departmental collaboration in an effort to stimulate the entrepreneurial ecosystem of our university through the growth of student-run creative ensembles."
Chloe Kov
Chloe Kov
Product Design
"My main objective in life is to be apart of the change and progression towards creating sustainable solutions to combat climate change. Entrepreneurship can be a tool for affecting climate change, but the entrepreneurship sphere often lacks diversity and its only through diverse thoughts that one can elicit innovation. Oftentimes, a product or system may be inaccessible to marginalized groups of people because it has been created by a room full of only white men. My goal as a designer is to identify systems and processes that will lead to a more equitable-designed entrepreneurial ecosystem."
Samuel Lester
Samuel Lester
Bioengineering
"It takes a village to innovate, and where that village collaborates is a big part of the story, especially during these COVID-times.  The DeArmond Makerspace, the UO Craft Center, and the Knight Campus are excellent spaces to create, but to best utilize these 'colab' , I want to focus my attention on leveraging the limited time we have campus-wide to more effectively work and connect as a community."
Anjali Mishra
Anjali Mishra
Political Science and Sociology
"Innovative approaches to social, political, and economic issues are essential to social good and that equipping students of all majors with entrepreneurial skills can cultivate a collaborative environment that is crucial to progress. Like many social science and humanities majors, I don’t have access to a significant amount of information surrounding entrepreneurship and this has prevented me from gaining skills in civic entrepreneurship, which is something that I plan on pursuing throughout my life. I strive to bridge the gap in UO’s entrepreneurial ecosystem by focusing on making information about entrepreneurship accessible to all majors."
Luke Rebar-Bowling
Luke Rebar-Bowling
History and Economics
"Entrepreneurship requires finding the right people. Everyone has ideas, but often they do not have the skill or connections to make them happen. I am interested in identifying ways to link people who have skills with those who have ideas."
Ethan Rife
Ethan Rife
Entrepreneurship and Finance
"As a founder, I know how hard it is to be an entrepreneur, especially as a student. I view it as my duty to give back by improving the system. One way I’d like to do this is by finding greater funding opportunities with board member style mentorship and management. Oftentimes an entrepreneur needs someone who is with them through the thick and the thin, someone who is engaged with skin in the game too. A meaningful student funder community that connects key local and statewide investors with student founders can bolster entrepreneurship here at the University of Oregon."
Billie Jo Risheim
Billie Jo Risheim
Law
"I am interested in the intersection of how certain disciplines collide in order to predict what will be profitable in the future. By examining the entire startup process-- from idea, to implementation, to commercialization--one can advance their understanding of innovation and how important it is to society."
Candi Rosario
Candi Rosario
Landscape Architecture
"Tapping into the adaptability that is inherently needed for entrepreneurs, I am inspired by methods that enhance innovation and problem solving by incorporating creative thinking practices into daily work activities. I aim to find ways in which failure and success are explored in a non-linear, non-conforming way. I intend on addressing gaps that underutilize creative outlets as a way to unlock potential for inspiration, problem solving, and innovation in any field of work."
Souhail Siddiqi
Souhail Siddiqi
Advertising
"Even though UO is the birthplace of Nike and many other successful businesses, we have not done enough to highlight our school’s entrepreneurial prowess. My vision is to bring together various campus departments with their respective skill sets to develop a legacy brand that will showcase our entrepreneruial spirit."
Maya Tagwerker
Maya Tagwerker
Business Administration
"I have a drive to help underrepresented student communities and identify meaningful resources for students of color. Right now, I think that students and certain faculty are really suffering and a priority of mine is to  listen to the student base. Performative action is no longer acceptable, and I would hope being apart of the cohort would allow me to create some change and carry these resources into my professional life."
Jacqueline Zhang
Jacqueline Zhang
Mathematics and Economics
"I hope to integrate my advocacy for diverse voices with my zeal for start-ups to create an inclusive campus ecosystem. My interests include focusing on social enterprises that help connect the university and local entrepreneurial ecosystem together to foster a cross-disciplinary community."

Student Fellows' Blogs

Reframing Diversity and Inclusion by Chloe Kov

For the Provost Innovation Student Fellowship we were all tasked with creating our own entrepreneurial initiative within the UO ecosystem. I saw this as an opportunity to address both the lack of diversity in the school's entrepreneurial ecosystem as well as create more opportunities for sustainable innovation. My goals are to design and provide resources, services, and/or systems for students (with a focus on targeting underserved communities) at UO to pursue sustainable innovation practices.

Does Anybody Know Anything? by Souhail Siddiqi

I’ve always felt unworthy of labeling myself as an Entrepreneur. I don’t think a lot of people should call themselves an Entrepreneur. There is a level of dedication that goes with that life that I personally haven’t experienced yet. My life has been consumed with side hustles and mini projects, meaning that I feel okay labeling myself as one with entrepreneurial tendencies, but for now, that is all there is to it. I think there are a lot of people who feel the same.

Turning Our Weakness Into Our Strength by Luke Rebar-Bowling

Every college startup community has some circumstantial aspect  that makes it unique. I have been asking myself what that could be for the University of Oregon. There are many possible special factors, including the common things like the University vibe or natural environment. Those are difficult to understand, and common topics of conversation. I want to consider a possible strength that many would call a weakness: the lack of a medical or engineering college at the University of Oregon.

by Anjali Mishra

During my time at the University of Oregon, I have been greatly impressed by our students’ ability to apply innovative solutions to our community’s most pressing needs. From highly active student organizations to meaningful faculty spinouts, the University of Oregon is home to a prolific hub of problem-solvers. While there is no lack of creativity and innovation on campus, the concept of entrepreneurship has become an isolated term that typically only resonates with individuals in our campus’ business-related programs.

by Lauren Babcock

I am in the nonprofit sector; terms like ROI, venture capitalism, and investment feel like learning a new language. Public service is and will always be what motivates me, but the more time I spend working at and studying nonprofits, the more sure I become that our nonprofit-centric model of community aid is not sufficient. Nonprofits face chronic financial challenges that can lessen the impact of their work. 

Are there some incredible nonprofits? Absolutely. Do I think there might be another way to better help our communities? Yes.

by Sam Lester

"May you be happy, May you be healthy, May you be safe, May you live with ease."
- Lovingkindness Meditation

by Jacqueline Zhang

One of my biggest takeaways from the past few months of beginning the Provost Innovation Fellowship has been the fact that startup communities operate like social networks. As Ian Hathaway drove home in the talk he gave at UO in February, a few dozen entrepreneurial leaders acting like “supernodes” can drastically change an entire startup ecosystem community.

by Mitch Davey

Greetings, all!  My name is Mitch Davey, and I am a part of the inaugural Provost Innovation Student Fellowship cohort.  I currently working towards an MM in Composition and Graduate Certificates in Arts Management and Nonprofit Management here at the UO.   I am composer, conductor, vocalist, and arts entrepreneur, having previously served as founding Artistic Director of the Spectrum Singers, an all-inclusive, multi-generational chorus based in my hometown of Spokane, Washington.

Are You There Oregon? It’s Me, Entrepreneurship by Maya Tagwerker

I used to think of entrepreneurship as some distant and unattainable goal for anyone. It is been ingrained that there is only one type of person for entrepreneurship and that is absolute. It is hard yes, but I have enjoyed observing the last couple of years those who have articulated and analyzed what it has meant to be an entrepreneur. Truth is, anyone can be an entrepreneur. For me, I never thought of entrepreneurship until mid-way through my college experience. Since then, I have been locked in.

by Ethan Rife
by Candi Rosario

I wonder if you have ever called yourself an inventor or an entrepreneur? There is room for innovation in every industry, in every corner of the world. Yet, I often find that we frequently miss the opportunities to claim our role in future thinking, at least when it comes to labeling ourselves as innovators. Even in traditional work environments there is room for improvement and a constant need for more diverse ideas. The slightest need for something new can sprout inventions or research that progress us in exponential ways, and anyone of us could be the catalyst for that change.

by Billie Jo Risheim
As a law student interested in intellectual property law, I already had a strong foundational knowledge of the topic, but this fellowship has shown me how important individual entrepreneurs are to the grander innovative scheme.