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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Dedicated teacher of teachers wins Charles Carpenter Fries Award

by Sarah Buckley

English professor Carlin Borsheim-Black’s dedication to teaching future English teachers is being noticed and rewarded.

The Michigan Council of Teachers of English (MCTE) proudly honored Borsheim-Black as the recipient of the highly esteemed Charles Carpenter Fries Award for 2024-2025, an award that recognizes an individual with a distinguished career in advancing the teaching of English.

MCTE members recognized Borsheim-Black’s years of service at the local and national level and her passionate dedication to being a leader at the intersection of literary instruction, antiracist education, and dialogic teaching.

Borsheim-Black, also a former high school teacher, says the award is a great honor.

“Receiving the Charles Carpenter Fries Award is especially meaningful to me because it comes from members of my English teaching community, who I respect and admire so much,” said Borsheim-Black.

Throughout her career, her scholarship has focused on possibilities and challenges of antiracist teaching, especially in predominantly white, rural, and politically divided communities. Her book, Letting Go of Literary Whiteness: Antiracist Literature Instruction for White Students, co-authored with Dr. Sophia Sarigianides, was recognized with the 2022 Outstanding Book Award by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education.

Borsheim-Black will serve as the Fries honoree for the current school year and will be celebrated at the spring conference of the Michigan Council of Teachers of English in March 2025.