ICCI

Mobely-Thompson Creative and Innovation Summer Academy

About ICCI

John W. Thompson, CEO of Virtual Instruments and Chairman of Microsoft Corporation, and his wife, Sandi, have donated $1 Million a year for 5 years to his alma mater, Florida A&M University. Seventy percent of the funds are earmarked for academic scholarships, and 30% are set aside for FAMU's School of Business and Industry to establish the Interdisciplinary Center for Creativity and Innovation (ICCI) to expose underrepresented students to creativity, innovation, and intra/entrepreneurship with a focus in the area of technology. The Center, directed by Dr. Jason Black, Associate Professor in SBI, and under the leadership of the Dean, Dr. Shawnta Friday-Stroud, seeks to bring together researchers, students and alumni across all disciplines in the effort to establish and build a climate of technological commercialization and business creation and ownership. Launching officially in Fall of 2015, ICCI will contain five major components:

1) A Business Incubator, housed off-campus and co-managed by the FAMU Small Business Development Center, which will provide access to classes, seminars, and workshops on business development and entrepreneurship. The Incubator is also a partner with the Tallahassee Domi Ventures, a small business development hub coordinated by local Tallahassee businesses, educators and government officials.

2) An Intra/Entrepreneurial Curriculum, providing courses for both undergraduate and graduate students who wish to be trained to take initiative and calculated risks, "think outside of the box, as well as exhibit effective leadership and strategic decision-making skills within existing businesses or new business ventures.

3) An annual Business Plan Competition Day, where students and faculty can compete for free access to the Incubator for one year, to build their ideas submitted in the competition.

4) An annual Lemonade Day Event, coordinated by faculty members of ICCI, which invites kids throughout the Big Bend area to participate in the National Lemonade Day event each year, teaching the kids how to plan, start and operate a lemonade stand business.

5) An annual Summer Camp, the Mobley-Thompson Creativity and Innovation Academy, which works to expose students grade 3 through 12 to intra/entrepreneurship, technology, and other academic concepts through interactive, fun and hands-on learning activities.

"We are thankful to John and Sandi for their generous gift, which we will use to create this excellent example of innovative intra/entrepreneurship programming," said Dr. Shawnta Friday-Stroud.