<p>The Thematic Inquiry course provides the foundation for the Entrepreneurship Pathway. This course is a one-semester, experiential learning program designed to teach and enable student entrepreneurs to develop sustainable business models from their ideas. The program will bring together an ambitious, committed, and diverse group of individuals from all classes and majors who are passionate about developing successful solutions to challenges; identify as entrepreneurs, disruptors, and thought leaders; and have the tenacity, work ethic, and ability to succeed. This course will feel like a combination of a college class and a rigorous startup incubator program. You will develop and accurately test business assumptions, identify and research your target market, and pivot to develop a sustainable business model.</p> <p>This course will also include a lab component, facilitated by a guest lecturer from reSet, a Hartford-based incubator space, or a Connecticut College professor or alumni with expertise specific to the topic of the lab. For example, alumni startup founders might speak one week about their experiences and challenges and lead a case study</p>

Entrepreneurship, Social Innovation, Value and Change

Problems need innovative and creative solutions. Learn to apply entrepreneurial theory to a wide range of issues for valuable results.

At its core, entrepreneurship is about creating value by inventing things to address necessities. In this way, it is about designing something for a target group (market). But entrepreneurial intervention is fundamentally about people—who’s doing the entrepreneurship and to whom it is being done. Entrepreneurship offers students intangible growth in learning how to empathize with others, including those from very different backgrounds, to address a social issue in a flexible, adaptable and context-relevant way.

Students in this Pathway will gain an understanding of entrepreneurial theory as it applies across multiple fields of inquiry, emphasizing connections to creativity and innovation. They will gain a familiarity with past and present applications of entrepreneurial theory and develop entrepreneurial problem-solving skills that enable them to identify a problem or need, articulate a model for addressing this concern, and generate an ongoing sustainable solution. Students will also locate their problem-solving skills in the context of the communities in which they live and weigh the value of their efforts with regard to ethics and sustainability.

Alex Mitchell '25

Entrepreneurship, Social Innovation, Value and Change

While students construct their own animating questions, some recent examples include:

How do entrepreneurial paths differ for women across various racial, socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds, and how do these experiences compare to men’s?
Can innovations in sourcing, production and recycling of retail clothing minimize the impact of a “throwaway” clothing culture in the U.S.?
How can the achievement gap in education be reduced through the use of technology in the U.S.?
How can movement practices be used to help students with learning disabilities?
What effect can financial literacy programs have on students in the United States across socioeconomic classes?

Pathway Requirements

Thematic Inquiry

Global/Local Engagement

Pathway Courses

All students in the Pathway will complete at least three Pathway courses, based on their specific interests and animating questions.

Example Courses

All-College Symposium

This major student conference highlighted students’ integrative learning in Connections , the College’s reinvention of the liberal arts.

Through talks, panels and poster sessions, students who participated in the College’s Centers for interdisciplinary scholarship or the Integrative Pathways showcased how their coursework and experiences informed their studies and learning over four years.

All-College Symposium

Pathway Coordinator

Noel Garrett

Entrepreneurship Pathway Coordinator, Dean of Academic Support, Executive Director of the Academic Resource Center, Adjunct Assistant Professor of Economics

Joining Connecticut College in 2013, Noel serves as both the Dean of Academic Support and the Director of the Academic Resource Center. As dean, he oversees the Academic Resource Center and the writing center. Noel serves as a liaison between the Dean of the College and faculty regarding areas that have to do with student academic success.

Core Faculty & Staff

Connections

P: 860-439-2899 E: eofri@conncoll.edu

Mailing Address

Connecticut College
Fanning 206
270 Mohegan Ave.
New London, CT 06320

Contact

Libby Friedman ’80
Assistant Dean of Connections

Office

Fanning Hall 206