Higher Education : Buzz

When Columbus Area Technician School opened with 67 students in the basement of Central High School in 1963, no one had any idea what it would become because it was an experiment.

With 25,000 students today, the school, now known as Columbus State Community College, will celebrate its 50th birthday at the end of this month. It is the front door to a college education for more central Ohioans than any other local school, officials say.

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The University of Dayton Business Plan Competition boasts nearly $190,000 in cash prizes and other support and is open to anyone in the Miami Valley region. The submission deadline is October 12.

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The University of Cincinnati and Ohio University claimed spots one and two, respectively, on a list of 12 top U. S. colleges where students get the "best bang for their buck."

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The world of computer-animated films wasn't on Paul Gerard's radar when he was pursuing a business degree at Miami University.

"I actually was going to get into banking. I had a very circuitous route from Miami University to Hollywood," says Gerard, director of creative development at DisneyToon Studios since 2008. The '89 Miami alum plays a key role in developing stories for films that will come to life on the silver screen.

He's been busy promoting Walt Disney Pictures' latest release, "Planes," which landed in theaters Friday, Aug. 9.

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Forty-seven Akron Public School graduates will receive the University of Akron’s (UA) first Innovation Generation Scholarships this fall. UA is awarding the full-tuition scholarships to high-achieving Akron students in exchange for the district’s oldest high school building.

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Earlier this week, Youngstown State University announced a record fundraising year, amounting to more than $10 million in private support from alumni, corporations, foundations and friends in the 2012-13 fiscal year.

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The giant machine might be anchored to the floor, but program everything right and it can fool a super-sized bearing into believing it’s 300 feet in the air. The equipment occupies one-half of a bay in the Stark State College and Timken Co. Technology and Test Center. Timken researchers can run tests to find out how bearings will stand up under a variety of conditions that the machinery can simulate.

Funding for the project came from: Timken Co., $6 million, Stark State College, $3 million, supported by $500,000 from the Timken Foundation, Ohio’s Third Frontier commission, $2.1 million, Ohio Air Quality Development Authority’s Advanced Energy Jobs Stimulus Program, $1.5 million.
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FlashStarts partners Charles Stack and Jennifer Neundorfer will work with Oberlin College’s existing entrepreneur program throughout the year to provide guidance and mentoring to students. At the end of the program, one team will be selected for the Oberlin Entrepreneurship Fellowship at the FlashStarts Accelerator.

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The dean and chief administrative officer of the Trumbull campus of Kent State University, Robert Sines, has been named interim dean of the university’s college of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). He will serve in that post through June 2015.

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The University of Dayton’s Science Center, library and other buildings are the target of nearly $30 million in work being done this summer.The work is part of UD’s investment of approximately $155 million in its campus in recent years. The private Catholic school has doubled its land footprint in the last 10 years.

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ATHENS, Ohio (April 11, 2013)—Six Ohio University students shared the $10,000 grand prize of the inaugural Scripps Innovation Challenge on April 11 after presenting their idea for a mobile alarm clock app designed to encourage young people to consume news.

Broadcast journalism seniors Devin Bartolotta, Matt Digby, Glenn Janos, Leah Petrovich, Sarah Tranelli and management information systems junior Ryan Vibbert collaborated to design an app that would allow users to receive targeted news on their mobile devices at their desired time of day. Their challenge – to Craft a Strategy to Get More Young People to Consume News – was submitted by Ogden Newspapers.

“It started out as a class project and, as the idea developed, we realized it could be so much more,” said Tranelli. “We felt really confident about our idea and hoped we could come in here and get the judges to believe in it. Our professor, Mary Rogus, was behind us every step of the way, and we thank her.”

The Scripps Innovation Challenge, a campus-wide contest sponsored by the Scripps College of Communication, provided the opportunity for students to innovate creative solutions to actual challenges from the media industry.

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While the Ohio State men’s basketball team was competing in the NCAA Tournament, other members of the university community were working toward a different championship title.

OSU was crowned the winner of the second annual Environmental March Madness Tournament early Tuesday, defeating other schools in the “Sustainable 16” after filing out initial surveys.

The tournament pitted universities against one another based on each college’s environmental curriculum and sustainability efforts and was organized by Enviance, an environmental software company.

As the 2013 national champion, OSU will be awarded a $5,000 grant for its Environment, Economy, Development and Sustainability (EEDS) program. Its director will also get an all-expense paid trip to San Diego to attend the 2013 Enviance User Conference and be a part of a discussion panel in April.

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Some of us may have thought about an invention that could help make life a little easier. But without the resources or connections to make it happen, the bright idea goes dark and it’s left for someone else to create.

At Ohio State University, the Technology and Commercialization Office helps students and faculty turn their idea into reality. This year, the TCO expects to double the number of start-up businesses fostered by the office. WOSU’s reports on a couple of OSU innovators whose ideas are well on their way to success.

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Ever had to collect thousands of applications and whittle them down to find the best hundred candidates? Universities and businesses do it all the time, and it’s not an easy task.

New York and Cleveland-based DecisionDesk wants to change that. The company takes the application and selection process into the cloud, promising to make the lives of administrators a lot less stressful. And it just raised $1.75 million in new funding to keep innovating.

Through the convergence of technology development and design thinking, the IDEA Studio will focus on identifying important gaps or critical problems needing addressed and create technologies and solutions to solve these vexing problems.

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