CSUF Entrepreneurship Alumni Inspire Innovation at Cal State Fullerton

CSUF News just ran a story about three CSUF Entrepreneurship alumni and their continued work to promote innovation at Cal State Fullerton. The alumni, Lorenzo Santos ’17, Vanessa Ganaden ’18, and Yumi Liang ’18 were part of the Cal State Fullerton team to participate in the University Innovation Fellows (UIF) program. Hosted by Stanford University, UIF’s mission is to train students in the innovation process and empower them to bring their learning back to their home campuses. Thanks to generous support from Dan Black and Karl Freels, Cal State Fullerton has been participating in this program for a few years now and the CSUF Entrepreneurship has already been reaping rewards from this.

One great example of the power of the UIF program was seen earlier this semester when both Yumi and Vanessa visited Director John Bradley Jackson’s class to teach design thinking, a process that they learned while University Innovation Fellows. From Director Jackson, “[Design thinking] is a process for solving problems in a user-focused way. When done properly, the solutions are simply better. This way of thinking is applicable on campus, at work, and in life in general.”

And the trio of former UIF members recently were honored by the UIF program when they were selected to (quoted from the CSUF News article) “serve as event leaders at the annual UIF Silicon Valley Meetup. The trio welcomed the opportunity to share their innovation experiences with the crowd of 350 students and faculty from 96 higher education institutions in 15 countries.”

The whole article from CSUF News is well worth the read but I had to share one last thing, a poignant summation of how to propagate innovation all over campuses by Vanessa: “It’s hard to create an impact in a community on your own. Find a group of people who can support you and challenge you to become a better version of yourself.”

For more information about how to help the CSUF Entrepreneurship community become a more innovation group of entrepreneurs please contact CSUF Entrepreneurship Director John Bradley Jackson at jjackson@fullerton.edu or 657-278-8413.

CSUF Entrepreneurship

We are dedicated to helping the next generation of entrepreneurs develop the skills that they need to compete locally and globally. The CSUF Entrepreneurship program does many things, including: consulting projects where students serve up fresh strategies to actual businesses, competitions for students from middle school to grad school, helping entrepreneurs go from concept to launch, frequent seminars and office hours for entrepreneurs and professionals, and much more. Interested in becoming a part of the CSUF Entrepreneurship community? Reach out to us at csufentrepreneurship@fullerton.edu for more information! CSUF Entrepreneurship depends on the support of the community, please go here to donate.