How Higher Education Can be a Vital Catalyst for Entrepreneurial Growth

Even considering the jokes on HBO’s comedy series Silicon Valley, there is a prevailing attitude in the entrepreneurship community that paints higher education in a poor light. Take for example The Thiel Fellowship, a program started by Peter Thiel, one of the most prominent figures in the startup community, that grants $100,000 to young people “who want to build new things.” The idea behind the fellowship is that while college can be good at teaching students what’s been done before, it can discourage them from starting something new. It’s a fair point too; for years many university programs lacked major entrepreneurship programs that promoted startups in the same light that say a Peter Thiel has. But with that said, in our (my fellow Co-founders at indify and I) experience we have found that through the help of each of our universities, higher education can be a vital catalyst for entrepreneurial growth.The journey with our startup indify began far before we had any sort of business plan or one sheet in place. It started in the last place one would expect: the classroom. During the first semester of our senior year of college, our CTO Matthew Pavia and myself each individually took a Technology Entrepreneurship class at our respective institutions (Lehigh University and Marist College). The funny thing is that we had no idea that either of us had intended on taking this course nor were we aware that we would together launch a startup just a semester later.Through each of our courses we learned of the fundamentals of entrepreneurship (the art of the pitch, how venture funding works, the importance of scaling, etc.). In fact, Matthew was so inspired by his course that he decided to participate in a one-week tour of Silicon Valley sponsored by Lehigh during the subsequent Winter Semester. There he was able to better understand startup culture, specifically, what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur in today’s age.Meanwhile the third member of the team, CEO Keshav Garg, was inspired by his experience working as a summer intern for Warner Music Group and had the root concept of indify in mind. He was a student at Colgate University at the time and, with the help of fellow student Raffi Khatchadourian, was able to get his idea for indify into Colgate’s Thought Into Action (TIA) Entrepreneurship Institute, a program that supports, promotes, and advances entrepreneurial activity across the Colgate community. With the help of TIA, the two were able to find success, with indify winning a $15,000 grant called the Colgate Entrepreneurs Fund. They also gained an opportunity to participate in a summer incubator in Hamilton, NY that provided office space and mentorship for the winners of the Colgate Entrepreneurs Fund. Lastly, the two were awarded the chance to pitch the idea in a Shark Tank type competition that included panelists such as Jessica Alba, MC Hammer and more active entrepreneurs.Working closely with TIA founders Wills Hapworth and Andy Greenfield, Raffi and Keshav were able to formulate a strong pitch that Keshav successfully delivered to the panelists. The pitch was so successful that indify was given the most amount of funding out of all the other teams and received the most support from the audience. In the months following graduation, our team worked at the TIA Incubator in Hamilton and enjoyed the resources, mentorship, connections, and support needed to formulate a startup.Today Raffi has returned to Colgate while the three of us continue to utilize the knowledge learned and resources granted from each of our universities on a daily basis. Of course while this is simply an anecdotal story on how entrepreneurship and higher education can coexist, it’s also a model of how universities can provide their students with the resources necessary for them to translate their degree into creating new opportunities. Time will tell where indify ends up but when each of us look back at the journey, we’ll always know that our universities supported our efforts to get there.You can meet the indify team at NY TechDay on 4/141Special thanks to Connor Lawrence of indify