A student standing and speaking in front of a large crowd in French Auditorium.

Isabella Bank Institute for Entrepreneurship

We are a dedicated institute for student entrepreneurs across campus and beyond. We aim to maximize your success by fostering your entrepreneurial mindset, promote inter-disciplinary collaboration and provide support for the creation and development of your new ventures. Jumpstart your ideas and get involved today!

Tune in for excitement!

Passion. Potential. Pitches. Don't miss any of the 2025 New Venture Challenge excitement.

Tune in Friday, April 11 at 1 p.m. for great ideas and fierce competition. Then, join the judges, mentors, spectators and teams as they see who is going home with thousands of dollars in venture financing. The awards broadcast begins at 6:30 p.m. and one team will walk away as the overall best venture.

2025 NVC Competition Live Stream

2025 NVC Awards Live Stream

Start your entrepreneurial journey

Central Michigan University’s College of Business Administration is the home of the Isabella Bank Institute for Entrepreneurship and the first Department of Entrepreneurship in the state of Michigan. We are a student-centric hub where experiential, curricular, and external entrepreneurial opportunities intersect.

Our mission is to maximize student success by fostering a campus-wide entrepreneurial mindset that promotes inter-disciplinary collaboration and the creation of new ventures.

We aim to create innovative programming, boost cross-campus and ecosystem collaboration and provide a comprehensive mentoring program.

Our institute provides extracurricular opportunities and is open to all undergraduate and graduate CMU students.

Student opportunities

Meet experienced alumni, faculty, entrepreneurs, investors, and other business and political leaders.
Learn practical skills, innovative thinking, and connect with mentors and entrepreneurial resources.
Attend skill-building workshops and compete in pitch competitions and Hackathons.
Take part in special scholarship programs and travel experiences.
Pitch your venture at our signature New Venture Challenge event and compete for up to $20,000 in cash awards.

Find your path

Are you interested in becoming an entrepreneur?

Every journey is unique. Explore the opportunities that interest you.

A student standing with a faculty member holding big winning checks from the New Venture Challenge 2024.

Start up

Build up your venture idea.

Learn more

A student smiling and standing in front of his venture display at the 2024 New Venture Challenge.

Family business

Explore the Alternative Entrepreneurial Pathways category at NVC.

Learn more

A close-up of the Prusa i3 MK3 printer in the entrepreneurship makerspace, the IDEA Den in Grawn Hall 166.

Product and prototype design

Create and patent your ideas.

Learn more

Innovation

Explore your ideas and build your skills.

Learn more

CMU showcases games and learning at GenCon 2022

by Kara Owens

View of game play at convention The CMU Center for Learning through Games and Simulations (CLGS) was a community partner of GenCon 2022, the largest gaming convention in North America. Founded in 1967, GenCon has tens of thousands of attendees annually, with over 50,000 people in attendance this year. As community partners, the CLGS was able to have a table set up at the convention to promote CMU and all that the CLGS has to offer, including the Central Michigan University Press, online classes, and the Game Design Thinking minor offered at CMU.

The Central Michigan University Press is the only peer-reviewed tabletop gaming press, meaning that all the games that it prints are held to rigorous academic standards, including a double-blind peer review. The Press released its first game, Monumental Consequence, last year, and will be crowdfunding its next game, Rising Waters, beginning at the end of August. Additionally, the CLGS was able to playtest a third new game, Five Hundred Year Old Vampire, demonstrate The Hydrologic Cycle Game, created by CMU professor Wendy Robertson, Ph.D., and run a session of Monumental Consequence for attendees to play.

The CLGS also worked with GenCon to introduce online classes for an Applied Game Design Certificate. These classes are taught by board game industry experts supported by CMU and will be online and synchronous, allowing students to directly interact with these experts. The official launch of these classes was at GenCon on August 5th, and a full slate of classes will be presented in the 2022-2023 academic year.