Experiential Learning Essential to Entrepreneurship Education at Stanford

On a Saturday night, a student sits motionless in front of a laptop, except for his fingers frantically tapping out code in the basement of a building at Stanford. A hemisphere away, students who were complete strangers just a few days before gasp in unison as they approach a massive glacier in an inflatable boat.

Though the two images are literally a world apart, both are glimpses into just the kind of deeply immersive experiential-learning activities that have become an increasingly essential part of entrepreneurship education at Stanford.

The first scene is from a two-day event known as Startup Weekend, in which student teams have 52 hours to turn an idea into a startup. The second was a highlight from a five-day ocean adventure in which students from Stanford and South America came together last March on a vessel known as the EntrepreneurSHIP.

[quote_right]“The best learning is experiential.”[/quote_right]“The best learning is experiential,” said Tina Seelig, executive director of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), who first floated the idea for the ship. “As the entrepreneurship center at Stanford University’s School of Engineering, our role is to deliver engaging courses and perform scholarly research, as well as create one-of-a-kind learning experiences that enhance entrepreneurial skills.”

This is especially true when teaching entrepreneurship – where rapid prototyping, overcoming obstacles and responding to critical feedback are inevitable. Education needs to include equal parts coursework and exercises outside the classroom that allow students to apply what they’ve learned in real time.

Weekend Warriors

For Startup Weekend, an annual event hosted by several entrepreneurship programs at Stanford, students have from 5 p.m. Friday to 5 p.m. Sunday to form teams, bring a business idea to life and compete for top honors. Most students have never worked with each other before and must subject their projects to the scrutiny of entrepreneurs, investors and other Silicon Valley professionals who volunteer their time.

The event – presented last year by StartX, STVP and the Entrepreneurship Club at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business – is a blur of an experience from the get-go. Students warm up with improvisational exercises and ice breakers, then form teams, set up workspaces, develop pitches, meet with mentors and hone presentations – breaking only for meals.

All the while, they sharpen their interpersonal skills and refine their ideas on deadline. “Experiential learning allows students to be bold, but in a relatively safe environment,” said Angela Hayward, who has managed the Stanford Entrepreneurship Network. “It lets them get used to failure and the iterative process, and lets them get used to working with people they’ve never even met before.”

Startup Weekend returns this autumn and will welcome any Stanford student to apply. Last year, more than 500 students applied for 115 slots, resulting in 16 teams that turned the basement of the Huang Engineering Center into a beehive of activity.

“When you’re used to sitting in class and taking notes, it can be difficult to appreciate the real-world application of entrepreneurship,” Hayward said. “But when you’re in a group, and you’re working on something real, students get the opportunity to apply what they’re learning.”

Entrepreneurial Thinking at Sea

Now, take Startup Weekend and put it on a 64-cabin cruise ship bound for the southern tip of South America, and you begin to get a sense of a one-of-a-kind, experiential-learning adventure offered to students over their 2013 spring break.

About 20 students from Stanford took part in the EntrepreneurSHIP voyage, which brought them together with close to 60 students from Chile for five days of inspiring talks, hands-on activities and, naturally, excursions into the icy waters of Patagonia.

STVP, in collaboration with two of its Global Partners (Universidad del Desarrollo and Pontifica Universidad Católica de Chile) organized the trip. Seelig and other Stanford faculty – from STVP, the d.school and the School of Engineering’s Department of Management Science and Engineering – led exercises in team building, design thinking, prototyping and storytelling.

Educators and experts from Chile discussed social issues confronting their nation: from environmental protection and economic development to challenges in K-12 education. Students were then tasked with having to come up with solutions, overcoming language barriers (and occasional bouts of seasickness).

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“The projects that the student teams took on provided them with a framework to challenge themselves,” said Forrest Glick, one of STVP’s associate directors. “Working within teams, developing a point of view, leading a project, pivoting an idea and getting feedback – those are the kinds of entrepreneurial skills we wanted them to learn by doing.”

Close Encounters

Granted, experiential learning has long been recognized as an effective way to supplement and solidify in-class curriculum. And entrepreneurship educators at Stanford emphatically say such activities are downright essential for their students.

Just ask Lauryn Isford, who enters her junior year this fall as co-president of the Stanford Women in Business. She is majoring in management science and engineering in the School of Engineering and got involved in entrepreneurship at Stanford after going on a field trip to Google with her computer-science class.

Being in Google’s offices and seeing all the employees at work was one thing. But ending the day by being able to sit down with co-founder Larry Page for 45 minutes of question and answer impacted her in a way that few lessons can. Then a freshman, Isford asked Page what he wish he had known when he first entered college.

“As a freshman,” Isford recalled Page saying, “he wish he had known that it’s OK to take risks and not to be afraid to fail – because when you take those risks, even if things don’t go perfectly, you learn from those mistakes. And you can move forward with that experience.”

Hear how the rich array of experiences in and out of the classroom at Stanford has been essential to awakening Isford’s entrepreneurial mindset.