Taking Care of Business

For the past 10 years, Harvard GSE Innovation and Ventures in Education (HIVE) has provided a space for students and alumni to share new ideas, gain access to resources and networks, and develop solutions to global problems in education. With their newest initiative, the HIVE Draft Business Plan Review Night, HIVE aims to help burgeoning entrepreneurs craft their next educational venture.

Working with Professor James Honan, HIVE student leaders organized the first ever business plan review night on Wednesday, November 17 in the Gutman Launchpad. The at-capacity event allowed master’s and doctoral students to sit down with financial experts, including analysts from the Harvard Management Company, to share their visions of new educational enterprises and receive constructive feedback about their work.

Arts in Education student and event co-organizer Mike Lipset was pleased with both the response to the event and how it played out.

“The event flowed with a bubbling energy indicative of quality thinking toward complex problems,” Lipset said. 

Despite the many resources available for entrepreneurship at HGSE, some students found it difficult to have their business plans reviewed within the community.  This event was particularly inviting for those just beginning to think about their own business ideas and looking for initial feedback.   

“I would not be pitching my idea if they had not started up this educational entrepreneurship program,” said Human Development and Education doctoral candidate Andrew Scott Conning. Conning came to share his idea for WorldViews, a program designed to provide opportunities for immersive global learning to undergraduates. The students would split time between their home campuses and a network of global sites, graduating in five years with both a bachelor’s degree and a master’s in global public policy.

"The HIVE and iLab (Harvard Innovation Lab) initiatives have made launching an enterprise a much smoother and clearer path,” Conning said. “They are helping me make the greatest possible impact I can have with my career, taking advantage of new technologies to create better ways of learning."

The chance to talk to experts in the field was a big draw for students who each got the chance to sit down and share their visions with two different consultants, including  Jonathan Paul, assistant vice president of finance at Harvard, and Eric Hultmark, the associate dean of finance at HGSE. 

HDP student Ying Wang pitched Teach for the Future, which seeks to provide support for teacher exchange between China and the United States, including assistance with visa applications and any language barriers between teachers and the local schools. 

“I hope to find out if there are any voids in our business plan, anything else we should take into consideration before we launch it,” Wang said.  “I think the more people who hear about it is helpful.” 

In addition to financial and legal insight, the event also provided moral support to students worried that their plans might not be feasible. 

“I came into this having just spoken to my chair of finances on my board who had torpedoed my budget,” said Learning and Teaching master’s student Charlotte Brayton Dungan, whose Dimensions Family School — a school providing resources and support for homeschool families — is opening in fall 2016 in Durham, North Carolina. After her consultation at the event, Dungan came away feeling “very encouraged.”

“One reviewer helped me come up with ways to present the budget to show how we will be solvent with uncertain numbers,” she said.  “I’m feeling better, and I have one more meeting to go.” 

With a successful first showing, HIVE hopes the business plan review night will become a regular part of their annual entrepreneurial events, which include weekly Wednesday HIVE nights and the Education Innovation Pitch competition. 

“Attendees received positive and constructive feedback on their ideas,” Lipset said.  “The analysts said they would do the event again and enjoyed their conversations with students.”