Students to discuss business ideas, receive feedback from professionals
A panel of students will present their business ideas and receive feedback from the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Club on April 16. Photo contributed by: Connor Coughlan
The Innovation and Entrepreneurship Club at the University of Rhode Island is holding its final meeting of the semester on April 18, which will feature a panel discussion of three club members to spotlight their business ideas and receive feedback and questions.
The club is run through the college of business, however, according to club member Connor Coughlan, a junior marketing major, not all of the students are entrepreneurship majors or even business majors.
According to club president Dante Driscoll, a senior majoring in general business, the main goal of the panel is to get their members’ business ideas out to both professionals and to other students, as well as to inspire other members to pursue their own businesses.
The speakers at the event will be Tatiana Alomancy, founder of WR7DVIEWS, a podcast which discusses the arts and is aimed at giving listeners a new perspective, Kirstin Borczynski, founder of Artisan Bridge, a business dedicated to providing economic opportunities for Guatemalan artist through selling their art and Anyla Lee, founder of By Anyla, a Black female-owned brand specializing in crochet clothing and designs.
This will be the first panel where the club’s own members will be presenting, however, they hosted a panel with Women in Business last semester in the Welcome Center.
Coughlan will be moderating this panel, something that he said is important to him as it will help him with his public speaking.
“I’m going to look back on [the last panel], look at which questions did work and which questions did not get good responses,” Coughlan said.
According to Driscoll, the club’s main goal is to spread ideas and create a space for students to talk about their ideas and get feedback from their peers.
“We are all about spreading innovative and entrepreneurial ideas all around campus,” Driscoll said. “We host a lot of entrepreneurs from various industries to come and share their journeys about being entrepreneurs, how they started their company, how they grew it, and the lessons they learned along the way.”
According to him, the club does not only look for URI alumni to speak at their events, but also entrepreneurs from all over the state. In addition, they have worked with clubs from other colleges and universities in the state, such as Providence College and Bryant University, on things such as networking and setting up speakers for their events.
Driscoll said that they often reach out to former guest speakers to see if they have any friends or colleagues who would be interested in speaking with them as well, which has earned them many speakers.
“Our first guest speaker, she did a phenomenal job, and she sent two people our way [who spoke to us,] and we reached out to them and they did a great job as well,” Driscoll said.
Coughlan mentioned that entrepreneurship is a very important practice right now with many trying out their own business ideas after the COVID-19 pandemic, and that innovation and entrepreneurship is a rather new major on campus, first being offered to students in 2018, so it is important for the club to bring experienced professionals in to further the ideas and concepts of each student.
Both Driscoll and Coughlan said that entrepreneurship is important, as it helps modernize and expand ideas, and these panels with Q&As and discussions are important to inspire people to take up their own businesses.
The event will be held April 18 at 4 p.m. in Ballentine Hall and is open to the public.