SU Named as an Economic Development University Center

Syracuse University, in partnership with CenterState Corporation for Economic Opportunity (CenterState CEO), has received a $500,000 award from the U.S. Commerce Department’s Economic Development Administration (EDA) and the designation as an EDA University Center. The award is aimed at igniting innovation and accelerating entrepreneurship, and launching student ventures throughout upstate New York.

SU was one of 21 universities nationwide—and the only one in New York state—to receive the designation. The University Center builds upon a successful Kauffman Foundation demonstration program launched in 2009 that brought together a group of regional colleges and venture development organizations to focus on student startup companies as a regional growth strategy. Together with a $1.7 million endowment to the Raymond von Dran Innovative and Disruptive Entrepreneurship Accelerator (IDEA) Fund at Syracuse University, the gift provides sustaining funding for the effort to help student entrepreneurs start new businesses and nonprofit organizations that will in turn provide economic growth in Central New York.

Bruce Kingma, SU’s associate provost for entrepreneurship and innovation, and Linda Dickerson Hartsock, vice president for innovation and technology, CenterState CEO, and director of industry collaboration for the Syracuse Center of Excellence (SyracuseCoE), collaborated on the proposal on behalf of SU and CenterState CEO, regional colleges and universities and a coalition of community-based resource partners.

Although IDEA is a collaboration between SU and the Tech Garden, it is open to all student entrepreneurs across disciplines from colleges and universities in central upstate New York. IDEA’s educational partners include Binghamton University, Cayuga Community College, Clarkson University, Colgate University, Cornell University, Cortland State College, Le Moyne College, Morrisville State College, Onondaga Community College, SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, Tompkins Cortland Community College, the University of Rochester, Wells College and Upstate Medical University.

For the full news release visit, SU News