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Outdoor Weber: Outstanding Results

Within three weeks of Weber State announcing its inaugural outdoor recreation business pitch competition, more than 80 college students from across North America had submitted ideas to the Outdoor Weber contest. 

The ultimate opportunity for hopeful entrepreneurs, Outdoor Weber offered a $30,000 prize and chances for students to advance their own products or concepts, be mentored by industry experts and get startup tips from the star of CNBC’s The Profit Marcus Lemonis. 

WSU’s Hall Global Entrepreneurship Center hosted the competition, and Camping World sponsored the event. Online voters determined 25 semifinalists after watching video pitches on the contest webpage. Industry experts selected 10 finalists from that group. Judges chose the winner — a Grand Valley State University team that developed a mask to warm up air in cold weather.

“In its inaugural year, Outdoor Weber was a phenomenal success, proving there are many entrepreneurial trails still to blaze,” said Brandon Stoddard, Hall Global Entrepreneurship Center director. 

The large public response was due partly to Ogden Peak Communications, WSU’s student-run public relations firm that provided communication and marketing support throughout the contest. Ogden Peak’s efforts contributed to the 200,000+ webpage views on the contest site. 

83:

The number of ideas pitched in the Outdoor Weber contest

101,300:

The number of votes the ideas received online

Goddard: A Global Player

In 1998, WSU’s John B. Goddard School of Business & Economics and Shanghai Normal University (SHNU) entered into a partnership to share expertise and teaching strategies across cultures. Twenty years later, the partnership is bigger and stronger than ever. Weber State professors teach regularly in China; a 2+2 program allows SHNU students to complete two of their undergraduate years in Ogden and two in China; and a study abroad program gives WSU students opportunities to learn in Shanghai.

The partnership with SHNU is one of several international programs offered by the Goddard School. “Business is global,” said Dean Jeff Steagall, “and the only way to understand globalization is to experience life abroad directly.”

Shihao Li, a 2+2 alumnus, says this about the program: “It is of vital importance for young people like us to see a different world. Knowledge from other perspectives prevent people from being arrogant. I believe the 2+2 program offers us an opportunity to discover the world under different cultures and teaches us to be humble to knowledge.”

7:

The number of students from the John B. Goddard School of Business & Economics who attended a prestigious cybersecurity summer fellowship at Carnegie Mellon University . Goddard students filled nearly half of the estimated 20 spots available in ?the program.

5:

WSU’s ranking in Best College Reviews’ 2018 list of 50 best value business economics bachelor’s degree programs

Charity for All

Everyone deserves a dignified place to die. That’s what prompted a group of MBA students to donate $1,000 to The Inn Between, which provides end-of-life hospice care to Salt Lake’s homeless men and women.

Business education usually focuses on how to make money, but students in Weber State’s MBA leadership course learn how to give money away — effectively and for impact.

Michael Vaughan, economics professor, donated money for three teams of students in the course to identify, select and contribute $1,000 each to a nonprofit organization.

“As we went through the process of interviewing these charities, I was able to see all the good things they do,” said MBA student Shawn Bell BS ’99. “I learned how much more we could all be doing to help and realized, ‘Wow! I haven’t been thinking about others enough.’”

Students also gave to the Ogden Rescue Mission’s Seager Memorial Clinic and Ogden’s YCC Family Crisis Center.