Westminster Entrepreneurship Center (WEC)
About the WEC
The Westminster Entrepreneurship Center (WEC) is located in the School of Business and offers Westminster students the opportunity to be exposed to concept creation, innovation of ideas and business ownership strategies. These activities are nurtured through practiced entrepreneurial exposures, state-of-the-art facilities, leadership collaboration, dynamic entrepreneurial engagements, competitions and events designed to offer students an unparalleled exposure to real world practical experiences.
Innovation Space
The WEC provides an informal meeting space for students, entrepreneurs, and advisers (in varied spaces) where groups can conduct conference calls on the wide screen smart TV, brainstorm in the Idea Center or meet in the Proto-Type Lab to use one of the 3-D printers.
- Prototype Lab - Resources for students to experiment and to prototype products and software
- Innovation Board Room - A unique state-of-the-art conference area designed to bring aspiring entrepreneurs together with industry leaders
- Networking Hub - An open collaboration area to accent the professional relationship building process
- Idea Center - Providing a home for student entrepreneurs, faculty, community business partners and others to work on building new enterprises
- Entrepreneurship Learning Center – A high-tech entrepreneurial learning center for students and businesses alike.
WEC Activities
- Student innovation refinement: https://www.bluetreealliedangels.com
- Blue Tree Allied ‘Shark Tank’ participation
- Regional and National competition opportunities
- External company consulting & due diligence participation
- Individualized mentor program
- Collegiate Entrepreneurs Organization Participation www.globalhq@c-e-o.org
- Career Development Programs-Venture For America: www.ventureforamerica.org
- Annual Entrepreneurship Symposium
- Community Entrepreneural Participator ecenter@lindenpoint.com
- Direction of Entrepreneurship programs: SCORE-Lawrence County: www.score.org
- Student Leadership participation:
Leadership Positions:
President
Vice President
Finance Director
Marketing Director
Social Media Czar
PR Director
Web Master
Due Diligence Project Manager(s)
- Career enhancement building opportunities
- Individual Mentorship/Coaching/Entrepreneurs-in-Residence guidance
- Internships/Externships
Highlights of success include:
- Recognized and placed at various collegiate entrepreneurship functions and contests.
- Preferred seat holder at the Blue Tree Allied Investor presentations
- Start-up businesses created
- Consulting clients who have grown their businesses throughout PA, OH, WV, MD, VA and NY
- Dozens of programs and seminars involving more than 100+ business leaders
- 55 members in the WEC Class of 2019
Programs
Individualized Innovation
The WEC offers Personalized innovation programs augment students’ personal and professional development whether they decide to establish a startup organization, join a Fortune 500 company, participate in social enterprises, or continue through academia.
Through offering idea acceleration, corporate incubation, mentoring, networking, competitions, and events, students can customize a program to advance their innovation efforts.
The WEC has a dedicated Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR’s) and other business leaders to provide individual coaching and mentorship through workshops and advisory services to assist with market research, business planning, models and presentations to understand market potential of business ideas.
Mentorship Program
Student members are introduced, connected and develop on-on-one relationships with industry leaders to learn from their industry experiences. These relationships offer students a road map to success as well as a way to network with small start-ups to Fortune 100 companies.
The WEC is in the rare position to have engaged executives & leaders from over 65 organizations who are willing to develop personalized student to mentor relationships.
Some of the Mentoring Organizations Include:
Organizational Outreach Programs
WEC External business outreach program offers each student to be part a of a consulting project team and work with an external company/opportunity in which the students will have an impactful influence over corporate decisions and due diligence reporting.
The WEC offers year long consulting programs allowing developing organizations to engage with students on a regular basis. The value of the program is witnessed by the increasing number of applications received by the WEC by developing organization’s desire to join this program. This program operates on opportunities both domestically and internationally.
This unique program is open to CEOs, small developing businesses, family businesses and developing new ventures who have an established entity that needs experienced guidance. Applicants for the program are carefully vetted to ensure both parties have an exceptional experience.
The recent outreach projects have involved:
- Product development & commercialization
- E-Commerce development
- Primary & secondary market research
- Brand development
- Patent-Copyright-Trademark research
- Grant/Ownership/Partnership solicitation
- Geographic Market expansion
- Social media marketing mix development
Socio-Entrepreneurship-Partnership with Enactus
One of the fastest growing sections of Entrepreneurism is Socio- Entrepreneurship/non-for-profit sustainable entrepreneurship activities. At WEC, there is a partnership with Enactus- a community of students, faculty, and business leaders committed to using the power of entrepreneurial action to enable human progress. https://enactus.org/
C.E.O
As a growing entrepreneurial center, WEC has been recognized nationally and is currently a member of the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization (CEO). https://www.c-e-o.org/
Upcoming Events
