CENTRAL VALLEY, Pa. -- A contingency of Lehigh Valley LaunchBox micro grant recipients and other students involved in entrepreneurship participated in the Penn State Student Entrepreneurship Summit on April 15, 2016, at University Park. The goal of the summit was to connect entrepreneurial students from across the Penn State campuses and to share best practices and lessons learned in the realm of student entrepreneurship.
Participants included Penn State Lehigh Valley students and IESE students Thomas Baker and Andrew Lee; Parkland High School student and creator of Get2Greater app Aryaman Khandelwal; Penn State Smeal College of Business student and Schreyer Honors College scholar Mike Egan; Penn State Smeal College of Business student and Schreyer Honors College scholar Joe Sullivan; Penn State Smeal College of Business student Karim Badre; Penn State Lehigh Valley student Tahaa Shaffi; Penn State Lehigh Valley student and Lehigh Valley LaunchBox student worker Uzo Acholonu; and Steve Boerner of Virtual Incubator Network.
Lehigh Valley LaunchBox Faculty Liaison Mike Krajsa; Penn State Lehigh Valley Director of Campus Development Patti Frey; and Penn State Lehigh Valley Advisory Board member Shane McGee accompanied the group to the summit.
“The summit was a great experience and also was great exposure for Lehigh Valley LaunchBox,” said Krajsa. “Our group was able to network, share ideas and learn about even more support resources available to them.”
The morning featured presentations from campuses on their respective entrepreneurial climates, mini-keynotes from startup founders on how they balance the student and entrepreneurial lifestyles and an entrepreneurial “Fireside Chat” with Penn State President Eric Barron.
Khandelwal was one of the featured presenters. He spoke on behalf of Penn State Lehigh Valley and Lehigh Valley LaunchBox on entrepreneurship in the region and how he has benefitted from being part of Lehigh Valley LaunchBox.
The Penn State Student Entrepreneurship Summit was sponsored by Invent Penn State and Innoblue.