This summer, a multidisciplinary team of undergraduate students, graduate students, faculty, and administrators led a project to investigate the viability of student-run ventures at George Mason. Student-run ventures are businesses operated on Mason’s campus that are run by students. This project was funded as a Summer Team Impact Project (STIP) by the Office of Student Scholarship, Creative Activities, and Research (OSCAR) and led by Karen Livingston, Associate Director for Entrepreneurship Programs, and Dr. Heidi Lawrence, Associate Professor of English.
In this team, undergraduate and graduate students from various disciplines were involved in a research-intensive internship that led to a strong foundation for implementing a startup student-run venture for the Mason population.
Dating back to 1894, the idea stems from Cornell University’s student-run business organizations that enable students to learn leadership and entrepreneurship through real businesses in the real world. At Mason, the summer 2020 team proposed a writing consulting business and a handmade goods business as the first Mason Student Agency (MSA) ventures Mason students can work in once it is launched.
The writing consulting business, aimed toward bringing students together who are interested in growing their writing and communications skills before graduation, will continue its development phase throughout the 2020-2021 academic year. In its full form, the writing consulting business would offer opportunities for students to gain professional skills and contacts in professional writing as well as gain the business skills and acumen needed to begin their own writing ventures and freelancing after graduation.
The ventures under MSA would operate as for-profit businesses—a distinguishing feature of MSA among existing student clubs and organizations on campus. Another feature that is being discussed for MSA is that students may have the opportunity to earn internship/course credit through participating in the venture.
Our research consisted of three phases: first, a research phase into other student-run ventures at universities nationwide; second, market research into our two pilot ventures; and finally a deliverables phase, where students produced a final report as well as their final research product—a promotional video on Mason Student Agencies (linked below).
The summer team will present their research at the Summer Virtual Celebration of Student Scholarship on Friday, August 14, sponsored by the Office of Student Scholarship, Creative Activities, and Research (OSCAR). You can read more about this and other OSCAR projects in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences here and find the Virtual Celebration here.
Further information can be found in our OSCAR video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nX-0h5quqdY&feature=youtu.be
Summer 2020 Team
Karen Livingston, CPA
Associate Director
Entrepreneurship Programs
Office of Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Dr. Heidi Lawrence
Associate Professor, English
Director, MA concentration in Professional and Technical Writing
College of Humanities and Social Sciences
YoonJi Kim
Graduate Assistant
PhD in Writing and Rhetoric
College of Humanities and Social Sciences
Kathryn Meeks
Graduate Assistant
PhD in Writing and Rhetoric
College of Humanities and Social Sciences
Jon Doctor
Information Technology
Volgenau School of Engineering
Desire Green
Criminology, minor in Legal Studies
College of Humanities and Social Sciences
Neha Jodhun
Information Technology
Volgenau School of Engineering
Linh Le
Electrical Engineering & Finance
Volgenau School of Engineering & School of Business
Natalie Ledesma
Art & Visual Technology, InterArts
College of Visual & Performing Arts, School of Art
Erin Ziccarelli
ISOM
School of Business
August 14, 2020