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.

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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.

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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.

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Innovation

Explore your ideas and build your skills.

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Scholarly pursuits: Research fellow

by Sanjna Jassi

CMU senior Lillian Hendrick receives prestigious National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

Central Michigan University senior Lillian Hendrick has been named a recipient of The National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship.

Maureen Harke, coordinator of the National Scholarship Program, said the highly competitive fellowship award provides recipients a three-year annual stipend of $34,000, along with a $12,000 allowance for tuition and fees at the student’s institution of choice. It also provides opportunities for scholars to conduct international research and participate in professional development programs.

Hendrick, a biology major from Freeland, Michigan, is a McNair Scholar and member of the Honors Program. She began participating in undergraduate research at CMU in her first semester on campus. She worked with biology faculty member Anna Monfils to research endangered butterfly species and with Kirsten Nicholson, curator of natural history at the CMU Museum of Cultural and Natural History, on a museum methods project.

“Conducting research has been one of my favorite things at Central, and through it I have grown immensely as a scholar and as a person,” Hendrick said.

Hendrick has presented her work at local, national and international conferences. She plans to use the fellowship award to continue the research she began at CMU — using museum collections to study the evolution and conservation of endangered butterflies.