Entrepreneurial workshops help prepare students to enter the workforce by sharing business information and establishing connections. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Computer_indust ry_entrepreneur_workshop.jpg
On Friday, January 17, Dr. Douglas N. Arion D’79 gave a presentation titled “What Your Mother….er….Advisor Never Told You: The Other Stuff You Need to Know.” The presentation discussed the career skills, knowledge, and attitudes that students pursuing a science-based education should develop in order to succeed in entrepreneurial environments. This issue is especially important given that many science majors today are prepared with the knowledge they need for research, but may not have the skills required to successfully engage in non-workplace related activities.
A physics major from Dartmouth, Arion earned his MS and PhD at the University of Maryland. He has experience working for the US government as a nuclear scientist and as an assistant vice-president of Science Applications International Corporation. Currently, he is a professor at Carthage College, where he directs an entrepreneurial studies program for science students called ScienceWorks.
Arion gave a short anecdote about how he was asked to become vice-president of a Fortune 100 company at the age of 30 and how had to learn how to run a business over a meal. He emphasized to his audience that business skills such as knowledge of finance, taxes, intellectual property, writing and speaking should be taught to students early in their education in order to prepare them for when they enter the workforce.
Arion believes that universities today should better prepare their science students for the professional world. Carthage College’s ScienceWorks program gives science students the entrepreneurial skills they need through classes, speakers, workshops, and other activities. Other institutions have developed similarly focused programs. Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth has added career skills into its engineering program, and some universities now offer a Professional Science Master’s degree, which includes both rigorous science studies and development of business acumen.
One of the first in the country, Carthage College’s ScienceWorks program is the brainchild of Arion. Though Arion himself had incredible success as a physicist with no prior business experience, he had often wished for more guidance. With his SciencWorks program, Arion teaches his students pricing strategies, marketing principles and other information that he wished he had known before prior to entering a business-oriented environment. The program has continued to flourish with high promotion and hiring rates among its graduates and increasing levels of alumni engagement.
How then might Dartmouth give its science majors the career skills they need? Some possibilities Arion mentioned were speaker series, guest lectures, industrial internships, and connections with organizations such as the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA). Resources for university science students preparing to enter the workforce include organizations such as the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization (CEO) and conferences such as American Physical Society (APS) sponsored “Entrepreneurial Education for the 21st Century.” Arion’s article “Things your adviser never told you: Entrepreneurship’s role in physics education” in Physics Today explains in more detail the importance of career skills for physics students today.