On October 7, 2008, the Board of Directors of the Kern Family Foundation awarded a grant of $1,322,500 to the Entrepreneurship Program at IIT. This five-year grant is being used to launch a student-centered flagship curriculum, the Kern Innovation and Entrepreneurship Academy (KIEA).
KIEA will inculcate IIT’s future engineering and science graduates with the entrepreneurial mindset, and will help IIT integrate, strengthen, and expand important components of undergraduate engineering and entrepreneurship education. KIEA will also address the country’s urgent need for the 21st century engineer and will transform undergraduate education and strengthen the Kern Entrepreneurship Education Network.
Our ultimate goals for the Kern Innovation and Entrepreneurship Academy are as follows:
• fostering an entrepreneurial mindset to create a new class of undergraduate intrapreneurial engineers that can impact industry earlier in their careers
• promoting entrepreneurship and innovation in manufacturing by bringing together students, local manufacturers, and industrial entrepreneurs for learning and exchange
• placing an emphasis on intrapreneurial skills to better prepare undergraduate engineers to work in new firms and existing small and medium-sized enterprises
• creating a class of young people with the societal values necessary to strengthen American competitiveness and reinforce the American way
• serving as a demonstration model that can be adopted, adapted, and implemented by other KEEN schools
Over the next five years, this grant will ensure that the Entrepreneurship Program at IIT can develop and sustain a unique undergraduate engineering entrepreneurship education program. We offer our sincere gratitude to everyone at the Kern Family Foundation for their generous support!