STVP’s Byers and Seelig Honored with GCEC Legacy Award

November 20, 2024
In Brief

STVP leaders were recognized for their pioneering work to advance entrepreneurship education in universities – and create a lasting impact on the field.

Award recognizes pioneering work to advance entrepreneurship education in universities – and create a lasting impact on the field.

As leaders of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), Tom Byers and Tina Seelig have nurtured the entrepreneurial spirit and skillset among Stanford students and aspiring entrepreneurs worldwide. On Saturday, their peers recognized their contributions with the GCEC Legacy Award, given by the Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers.

The award was presented by Brad Burke, associate vice president at Rice University and chair of the GCEC advisory board, at GCEC’s 2024 annual conference, hosted by Babson College. Burke highlighted the exceptional achievements and generosity of Byers and Seelig over multiple decades.

“Tom and Tina created an amazing program at Stanford, and then developed several programs to share their learnings with other universities in order to benefit other schools,” recalled Burke. “They have been extremely generous in sharing their learnings with others and in helping other schools learn from Stanford.”

Byers accepted the award on behalf of Seelig and himself. “Tina and I have always believed in the power of engineering and entrepreneurship to make a positive impact on the world,” he said. “Together, we strived to build programs and courses that emphasize principled entrepreneurial decisions and responsible technology innovation. It is deeply fulfilling and humbling to see these efforts recognized and appreciated by our GCEC colleagues.”

Byers accepts the GCEC Legacy Award on behalf of Seelig and himself.

Principled entrepreneurship and responsible technology innovation have been a focus of Byers’ since he joined Stanford in 1995. He established the Mayfield Fellows Program in 1996, has been a faculty director of STVP since its inception in 1997, and is the first holder of the Entrepreneurship Professorship endowed chair in the School of Engineering. Byers’ commitment also extends to advising programs like Hacking for Defense and Hacking for Climate, connecting entrepreneurship education with national security and sustainability challenges.

The value of an entrepreneurial mindset to solving a range of problems has also been an enduring and rewarding theme in Seelig’s career. “Teaching innovation and entrepreneurship to thousands of students over the past 25 years has given me great hope. The young people we are fortunate to teach are literally inventing the future, applying what they learn to create ventures that are addressing the biggest challenges facing the world,” she said. “I’m so grateful to the GCEC and its members for recognizing the value of our work.”

Seelig is executive director of Stanford’s Knight-Hennessy Scholars and faculty director emerita of STVP, where she served as executive director, faculty director, and professor of the practice in the Department of Management Science and Engineering. She founded and led numerous fellows programs, including what is now the Accel Leadership Program for graduate students and the Threshold Venture Fellows program for master’s students. Her courses on creativity and innovation, such as Inventing the Future, have prepared students for the ethical challenges brought on by rapid technological advancements.

“Teaching innovation and entrepreneurship to thousands of students over the past 25 years has given me great hope. The young people we are fortunate to teach are literally inventing the future, applying what they learn to create ventures that are addressing the biggest challenges facing the world.”

Tina Seelig

One of Byers and Seelig’s notable collaborative efforts includes an immensely popular course at Stanford that has been shared worldwide as the free video and podcast series, Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders (ETL). The series has provided students and lifelong learners with insights from such icons as Sal Khan (Khan Academy), Laurene Powell Jobs (Emerson Collective), Ed Catmull (Pixar), and Melinda Gates (Gates Foundation). Through the democratization of these resources via the eCorner platform, the impact of Byers and Seelig’s work extends far beyond Stanford, reaching a global audience of over 100,000 monthly viewers and listeners.

Byers and Seelig also worked to strengthen the ecosystem of entrepreneurship education. Starting in 2007, they hosted 50 “Roundtables on Entrepreneurship Education” (REEs) globally, fostering best practices and enriching the academic community’s approach to entrepreneurship in the U.S., Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Middle East. In 2011, STVP, in collaboration with Venturewell, embarked on the National Center for Engineering Pathways to Innovation (Epicenter), a transformative five-year project funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) aimed at catalyzing change in undergraduate engineering education.

About STVP

The entrepreneurship center in the Stanford School of Engineering, The Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP) empowers aspiring entrepreneurs to become global citizens who create and scale responsible innovations. As one of the few entrepreneurship centers situated in an engineering school, STVP has played a central role in defining how entrepreneurship is taught, advancing groundbreaking research on technology entrepreneurship and innovation, and catalyzing entrepreneurship ecosystems around the world. Grounded in research by faculty in Management Science & Engineering, STVP courses and programs include five student and postdoc fellows programs, a doctoral program, the Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders speaker series, and the Stanford Initiative on Entrepreneurs’ Resilience and Well-Being, a collaboration with the Stanford Mussallem Center for Biodesign.

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