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George Mason alumnus launches AI software startup for law enforcement training

Greg Johnson — Wed, 26 Feb 2025 16:05:48 +0000

George Mason alumnus launches AI software startup for law enforcement training Greg Johnson Wed, 02/26/2025 - 11:05

Delivering immersive, voice-driven simulations for law enforcement through building skills, gaining real-time feedback, and preparing for real-world scenarios, Kaiden AI is a software startup co-founded by its CEO Ali Aldubaisi, BS Neuroscience ’21.

Ali Aldubaisi

Aldubaisi had begun studying neuroscience at George Mason with the intention of going to medical school. However, the distance learning forced upon by COVID led him to think outside of the box and start his first company vRealm, an online tutoring platform.

After a few years working on the project, he co-founded Kaiden AI with his vRealm partner, Ali "AJ" Aldjaei. “When we first started, we were focused on the higher education market,” he says. “We initially built the AI platform for grading and evaluation. Like most startups, you build where you initially think is the right fit, and that’s going to be the market for you.” Throughout the process of building his startup and attracting investors, he would find each day bringing surprises.

After seeing limited traction in higher education, Aldubaisi and his team built a small-scale simulation demo to test a new direction. Among the first to see it was Steve Gladis, a senior scholar at George Mason’s Center for the Advancement of Well-Being and a former FBI special agent. He immediately recognized its potential for law enforcement training and encouraged Aldubaisi to explore that path.

“We put the MVP [minimum viable product] in front of police chiefs and academy directors, and their reaction was completely different from our earlier demos,” says Aldubaisi. “That’s when we knew we had to double down.”

Now, Aldubaisi and his team partner with law enforcement agencies and regional academies to implement their simulation platform, with organizations like the Northern Virginia Criminal Justice Academy currently piloting the technology. Recently closing a $1 million pre-seed round, Kaiden AI’s investors are venture capitalists largely outside of the law enforcement space.

Ali Aldubaisi (right) at the 2024 Patriot Pitch competition. Photo by John Boal Photography

Even though his current work does not appear directly related to neuroscience, Aldubaisi recognizes the value of his degree. In fact, he still keeps up with neuroscience journals, seeing the relevance between that field and running his company. Developing hypotheses and constantly experimenting has helped Aldubaisi and his team refine and optimize Kaiden AI, from its initial concept in January 2024 to its current phase today.

“A lot of the concepts mirror each other,” he says. “What goes into marketing, how to understand people, how people learn.”

In 2024, Aldubaisi led the keynote discussion at the Patriot Pitch Competition, an event organized by the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship to support ideas and early-stage business ventures from George Mason students and recent alumni. He is now in talks with Rebecca Howick, the center’s director of operations and engagement, about getting more involved with their efforts.

“Having a center where somebody in whatever discipline that they’re studying can articulate or put together an idea or experiment on ideas is so crucial,” says Aldubaisi. He knows there are many intelligent people with brilliant ideas who may be hesitant to pursue their ventures because they don’t know how they’re going to get the funding or backing.

Having gone through that process, Aldubaisi offers crucial advice to aspiring entrepreneurs that reflects his scientific background. “Having the courage to focus on that one thing that you’re trying to prove out is probably the biggest thing,” he says. “Second thing is always look at what your idea is as an experiment, and the goal is to prove or disprove as soon as possible.”

By following these guidelines, Aldubaisi and his team have surpassed fundraising milestones and are excited to put Kaiden AI into the hands of many more law enforcement students and officers.

In This Story

Rebecca Howick

Learn more about AI research at George Mason

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Ambitious management and marketing student leads in many organizations across campus

Greg Johnson — Wed, 15 May 2024 13:10:51 +0000

Ambitious management and marketing student leads in many organizations across campus Greg Johnson Wed, 05/15/2024 - 09:10

After two years of studying management and marketing at the Costello College of Business and the Honors College at George Mason �鶹��, Rakibul Alam’s academic credits have put him a semester ahead of schedule.

Rakibul Alam

Now planning to graduate in December of 2025, Alam has been working at an accelerated rate both inside and outside of the classroom. He saw how many opportunities George Mason had to offer, and he was keen to take advantage of as many of them as possible. Among his accolades so far are being named an Honors College Professional Development Fellow, co-founding the Collective Organizations of South Asia, serving as senator in the George Mason Student Government, being a student ambassador for the Costello College of Business, receiving the Shrivastava Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship, and being named the Schwartzstein First-Year Research Award Finalist for his research project, “Coastal Bangladesh: the Effect of High Soil Salinity & Sustainable Agriculture.”

Coming in his freshman year as a commuting student, Alam wanted to learn about the student body and find ways in which he could immediately get involved and feel at home at George Mason. The first group he joined was the Bengali Patriots Association, where he quickly became the freshman representative and most recently the treasurer. “Within the first two weeks, I also learned there was an election for student government,” he says. “I ran for election, and I won and have served as senator the past two years. Everything kind of spiraled from that.” Through the student government, he was also appointed as a student ambassador for the Costello College of Business. As a Costello College of Business ambassador, he’s interacted with and presented to students, prospective students, community partners, and even the Board of Trustees. The position has empowered him to build and expand on his skillsets as he showcases what it means to be a Costello College of Business student. Recently, he’s shifted his ambassador focus to marketing and has been creating social media content to engage the student body, reaching nearly 50,000 views.

This past April, Alam’s startup company, Project Hope, co-owned and established by management and entrepreneurship student Naila Ahsan, was awarded the top prize in Social Impact at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship’s Patriot Pitch Competition. “�鶹�� campaign endeavors to furnish annual provisions of safe, sustainable, reusable sanitary napkins to marginalized communities,” he says. “In Bangladesh, 85% of the menstruating population cannot afford necessary menstruating products. Therefore, we are on a mission to end period poverty.” Presenting the prize check to Alam and Ahsan was Sumeet Shrivastava, MBA ’94, an individual whom Alam now considers a mentor. Always proactive in getting involved and making connections, Alam connected with Shrivastava and Christine Landoll, director of business engagement at the Costello College of Business, at several events across the university. Receiving the Shrivastava Diversity and Inclusion Scholarship opened even more doors for him. The scholarship is awarded to students who are contributing to diversity and inclusion through their leadership roles. Rakibul Alam is an exemplary Shrivastava Diversity and Inclusion scholar.

While Alam has taken advantage of the myriad opportunities at George Mason, like with Project Hope, he has also identified and worked toward introducing new solutions and initiatives where he sees a need. He did this when he co-founded the Collective Organizations of South Asia. “The South Asian community was so strong, but it was very dispersed, and our goal was to unify under the organization,” he says. “�鶹�� main objective was to provide scholarships for South Asian students.” He is currently their vice president of internal affairs.

In addition to the organizations where he is an active member, Alam enjoys participating in events put on by others across campus. “Going to so many different cultural events helps make you a global leader,” he says. “Companies are very represented all over the world, so having that global understanding is very important.” From the get-go, he came into George Mason with a vision of using the university’s diverse resources to make his student experience as rewarding as possible. Furthermore, this summer he will be interning at the Pentagon with the United States Department of the Navy as a financial management intern. Only two years in, he has a resume stacked with accomplishments, a network connecting him with esteemed business leaders, and the drive to put all of his goals within reach.

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Sumeet Shrivastava, '94

Christine Landoll

Winning teams are selected at the annual Patriot Pitch Competition

Greg Johnson — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 19:21:12 +0000

Winning teams are selected at the annual Patriot Pitch Competition Greg Johnson Thu, 04/18/2024 - 15:21

Led by the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) within the Costello College of Business at George Mason �鶹��, the Patriot Pitch Competition supports early-stage business ventures and ideas from Mason students and recent alumni. On April 11, the finalists made their final pitches on the Fairfax Campus.

Patrick Soleymani

Before the finals commenced, 16 semifinalist teams, their mentors, and 16 semifinalist judges participated in the semifinal round via Zoom, providing them the chance to develop the skillset to pitch their ideas virtually to stakeholders. These semifinalists represented six colleges and schools from across Mason, including College of Engineering and Computing, Schar School of Policy and Government, College of Education and Human Development, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, College of Science, and the Costello College of Business.

After narrowing down the field to eight finalists, two teams in each competition track, the Johnson Center Bistro filled with spectators to watch and vote on the final pitches. In addition to earning $6,000 for first place and $3,000 for second place in each track, teams were eligible to be voted as Mason’s Choice Awardees by the audience members, receiving another $1,000 for each track. The tracks were Public Engagement, STEM, Social Impact, and General Entrepreneurship.

Seth Goldman and Ali Aldubaisi '21

Emceed by Patrick Soleymani, associate dean of outreach and strategic engagement at the Costello College of Business, the competition was proceeded by a keynote discussion with Seth Goldman, co-founder of Eat the Change, Just Ice Tea, and Honest Tea; and recent Mason alumnus entrepreneur Ali Aldubaisi, BS Neuroscience ’21. Aldubaisi asked Goldman about his challenges and triumphs as an entrepreneur, setting the stage perfectly for the next generation of entrepreneurs ready to make their pitches.

Each finalist team was given five minutes to make their pitch, followed by five minutes of answering questions from the panel of judges. The panels of finalist judges comprised Mason stakeholders, faculty, alumni, and other successful entrepreneurs, who were experts in the given competition track.

In all four tracks, the first-place winner was also voted the Mason’s Choice Award Prize winner, awarding each team a total of $7,000. For the Public Engagement Track, UR2CLOSE was selected as the top pick for their following distance indicator to be mounted on the rear license plate of a car to prevent rear-end collisions.

In the STEM Track, FlightCommand Pro was selected as the first-place winner. FlightCommand Pro’s mission is to provide better products and systems for drone operations, including drone deliveries flying with more certainty when beyond the visual line of sight. “As a part of my systems engineering senior design project, my team and I performed a context analysis and a stakeholder analysis to find the performance gaps for a case study about drone delivery to an island located in the Chesapeake Bay – Tangier Island,” says Diana Machuca, a senior studying systems and industrial engineering. “To bridge the gaps, we designed the Drone Range Dynamic System and came up with a business plan for the project.” Mason alumnus Scott Hine, BS Decision Science ’85, mentored the team, advising them to emphasize the humanitarian aspects of the product to appeal to people’s hearts. The team is looking forward to using their winnings to test their system using a real drone.

Project Hope, established by Naila Ahsan, a senior studying management and entrepreneurship, and Rakibul Alam, a junior studying management and marketing, was chosen as the top pitch in the Social Impact Track. In Bangladesh, where 85% of the menstruating population cannot afford the necessary menstruating products, Project Hope endeavors to furnish annual provisions of safe, sustainable, and reusable sanitary napkins to those most in need. “In 2016, I was hosting a warm clothes drive during winter, and I came across a young girl who was banished from her shack in the slum area,” says Ahsan. “To my surprise, I was shocked to see how she was struggling in the cold. But due to lack of access to period products and prevailing stigma, she was banished due to her periods!” Alam says, “I joined the venture to engage and partner with corporations and NGOs to accelerate the business’s growth.” Alam and Ahsan plan to convert their prize money into Bangladeshi taka and invest into the fast-growing business.

Taking the top prize for the General Entrepreneurship Track was Zachary Suh with ElderlyEats. Suh, a freshman studying marketing, created ElderlyEats to provide senior citizens with meal plans that are diverse, customizable, and nutritious. The idea came to him when his grandmother developed health conditions that made it difficult for her to digest food. “�鶹�� team of dieticians and chefs have carefully curated traditional meals elders are used to and incorporated common nutritional needs elderly people deal with, past just vegan and gluten free and accommodate common dietary conditions, such as Alzheimer’s and dysphagia,” he says. Suh is planning to use the prize money to develop meals vetted through dieticians and stronger customer discovery.

Sumeet Shrivastava, MBA ’94

Sumeet Shrivastava, MBA ’94, donor of the CIE’s Shrivastava Family Refugee and Immigrant Success through Entrepreneurship (RISE) program, announced the event’s winners, track by track, and welcomed them to the stage. External representatives from each competition track presented giant checks to their respective winners. The representatives were Beth Young, PhD Education Policy ’18, president of Quality Information Partners, Inc. and Commissioner of Fairfax City Economic Development; Gurdip Singh, divisional dean of the School of Computing in Mason's College of Engineering and Computing; Anil Sharma, CEO of 22nd Century Technologies Inc.; and John Hoeveler, manager of national business investment at Fairfax County Economic Development Authority.

Dean Ajay Vinzé

The 2024 Patriot Pitch Competition was a culmination of months, and sometimes years, of hard work, starting from the initial idea to the polished pitch in front of a room of audience members. For a month leading up to the semifinals, the teams met with their mentors and attended entrepreneurship training sessions with Costello College of Business faculty. The experience of the participants and the feedback they received will serve as a launching pad to becoming successful entrepreneurs. The event is another triumph of inclusive entrepreneurship for the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship and the Costello College of Business.

Thank you to the event’s sponsors: 22nd Century Technologies, Inc.; College of Engineering and Computing at George Mason �鶹��; Fairfax City Economic Development Authority; Costello College of Business Women in Business Initiative; Costello College of Business Management Advisory Council; Fairfax County Economic Development Authority; and the Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting at the Costello College of Business.

The CIE team led the organization of the event, helping make it an outstanding experience for all those involved.

If you are interested in being a mentor, judge, or sponsor of the Patriot Pitch, please email ciemason@gmu.edu to learn more.

2024 Patriot Pitch Competition Participants

Lead Event Organizers: CIE Team

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Mason’s research is best in Virginia in multiple EduRank rankings

Sarah Holland — Wed, 03 Apr 2024 16:41:23 +0000

Mason’s research is best in Virginia in multiple EduRank rankings Sarah Holland Wed, 04/03/2024 - 12:41

Eighteen George Mason �鶹�� programs are ranked the best in Virginia in a new report by EduRank that focuses on performance in research.

Students enjoy the cherry blossoms on the Fairfax Campus. Photo by Eduardo de Souza/Office of �鶹�� Branding.

Topping the list is Mason’s entrepreneurship ecosystem, which for the second consecutive year was ranked No. 1 among all public institutions and No. 2 among all institutions nationally.

Best-in-Virginia programs were spread across the university and included those from the Costello College of Business, the Schar School of Policy and Government, the College of Engineering and Computing, the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHSS), the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution, the College of Visual and Performing Arts, the Antonin Scalia Law School, the College of Education and Human Development, and the ROTC.

That research is supported by entities such as the Office of Research, Innovation, and Economic Impact, which has overall responsibility for Mason’s research enterprise and support of entrepreneurship and innovation. And Costello College’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship lets students dig into entrepreneurship, from the theoretical to the experimental.

Mason’s entrepreneurial ecosystem is anchored by the university and reaches out into the broader community. Mason Enterprise, a division of the Office of Research, Innovation, and Economic Impact, is a strategic collection of 24 programs that support entrepreneurs and small business owners across Virginia, and conducts more than 1,500 training programs and more than 30,000 hours of one-on-one counseling with entrepreneurs in the community and from universities each year.

It is that environment of research, discovery, and innovation, which is a main contributor to Mason’s R1 designation from the Carnegie Classification of Higher Education as one of the nation’s top research universities.

And though the EduRank rankings focus mainly on research performance, they are an indicator of the quality of the programs from which that research is produced.

“Mason is committed to accelerating the translation of research into practice by leveraging university talent, infrastructure, and partnerships to create solutions for societies’ toughest challenges at speed and scale,” said Andre Marshall, Mason’s vice president for research, innovation, and economic impact. “It is a credit to our faculty and students that Mason is a place where we can put theory into practice.”

Added Paula Sorrell, Mason’s associate vice president of innovation and economic development, “Mason was originally created by the business community to serve its needs, and for 50 years it has been doing just that. In the past four years, we’ve significantly amped up our tech entrepreneurship to support and mirror the rapidly growing tech economy, adding 16 new programs and counting.”

Research is the bedrock of entrepreneurship, Costello College dean Ajay Vinzé said.

The university’s top rankings “are in many ways reflective of our approach to business education and the business of higher education,” he said. “�鶹�� approach—built on the foundation of a rich university-wide entrepreneurial ecosystem, powered by a growing body of faculty research across multiple fields of study—is changing the arc of higher education expectation and delivery as we prepare the next generation of leaders.”

Costello College is a contributor to the top entrepreneurship ranking, along with the Schar School and the Mercatus Center, all of which produce volumes of research, articles, and papers for an abundance of publications.

Schar School dean Mark J. Rozell called entrepreneurship research “a very distinguishing feature for a public policy and government school.”

Its research at the Center for Micro-Economic Policy Research (CMEPR), for example, is focused on diversity and disadvantaged groups among entrepreneurs, especially those who are Black, immigrants, and female. It also looks at job creation by minority entrepreneurs in minority and low-income communities.

“The center brings an unusual contribution to research on entrepreneurship by focusing on these issues,” said John Earle, the center’s director and a Distinguished �鶹�� Professor, who has published more than 60 articles and scholarly papers. “While the typical focus for entrepreneurship studies is for performance, especially for firms receiving venture-capital support, CMEPR research analyzes a much broader range of businesses, and how public policies affect the entry, growth, and survival of those owned by minority entrepreneurs.”

At the College of Engineering and Computing, Dean Ken Ball noted that CEC faculty garnered more than $119 million in research awards in 2023.

Dean Alpaslan Ozerdem's Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution class. Photo by: Ron Aira/Office of �鶹�� Branding.

“I’m proud that our research has informed and strengthened our academic programs and led to innovation and economic growth that benefits society,” Ball said. “Mason has consistently been a national leader in cybersecurity, data analytics, software engineering, aviation, and web development. These rankings reflect the impact CEC researchers have in areas of engineering and computing that are relevant to everyone, as well as our leadership position among Virginia’s public universities.”

CHSS dean Ann Ardis said her college’s contributions to research in best-of-Virginia areas such as criminology, broadcasting, law enforcement, journalism, and political economy “are a testament to the scholarly excellence of our faculty. We take immense pride in our researchers’ contributions to Mason’s growing reputation nationally as a comprehensive R1 institution with strengths across a range of research areas.”

For Alpaslan Özerdem, dean of the Carter School, the ranking in conflict resolution “fuels our dedication to shaping a more peaceful and understanding world.”

Özerdem noted that the school has been at the forefront of teaching, researching, and implementing conflict resolution for four decades.

“So being recognized as the premier institution for conflict resolution in Virginia deepens our pride and reaffirms our vital role within the broader conflict resolution ecosystem of the commonwealth,” he said.

Here are the programs ranked the best in Virginia, with ranking among public institutions and overall national ranking; best in Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland (DMV) where noted:

Aviation: 8, 11 (best in the DMV)

Broadcast Journalism: 40, 58

Cinematography: 29, 48 (best in the DMV)

Conflict Resolution: 15, 28

Criminology: 19, 26

Cybersecurity: 21, 33

Data Administration: 19, 29

Entrepreneurship: 1, 2 (best in the DMV)

Human Rights Law: 9, 28 (best in the DMV)

Intellectual Property Law: 6, 18 (best in the DMV)

Law Enforcement: 5, 10 (best in the DMV)

Military Science: 33, 47

Political Economy: 14, 28

Public Policy Administration: 17, 29 (best in the DMV)

Radio & TV Broadcasting: 37, 55

Remote Sensing: 29, 39

Software Engineering: 11, 15

Web Development: 12, 18

See EduRank’s methodology here.

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Costello College of Business leads the way in entrepreneurship research

Jennifer Anzaldi — Thu, 21 Mar 2024 15:37:47 +0000

Costello College of Business leads the way in entrepreneurship research Jennifer Anzaldi Thu, 03/21/2024 - 11:37

In This Story

Toyah Miller

Heather Vough

*This article was originally published in the January 2024 edition of Impact magazine.

The college that now bears Donald G. Costello’s name is a fitting testament to his entrepreneurial legacy. This extends not only to coursework and outreach programs, which have long stressed entrepreneurship, but also to the faculty’s research expertise. Indeed, a number of Costello College of Business professors were key contributors to George Mason �鶹��'s being named the #2 university for entrepreneurship research in North America by independent ratings agency EduRank.

Here are just a few examples of researchers who have made meaningful contributions to the field in recent years:

Mahesh Joshi

MAHESH JOSHI
Associate Professor, Management

Mahesh Joshi’s more than 30 peer-reviewed publications mostly focus on fostering qualities and skills essential to entrepreneurial success, both within and outside large organizations.
For Joshi, good entrepreneurs are primarily defined by how they think and what they do. Start-up founders and small business owners share a problem-solving skill set with change agents working in big corporations.

“For long-term success of corporations or start-ups, every person has to think like a change agent,” Joshi says. “And that change agent’s approach comes through understanding certain variables like risk-taking, innovativeness, and how to handle the political situation whether you have autonomy or not. And if we do that, we are building the whole toolkit of corporate entrepreneurship or regular entrepreneurship.”

For example, Joshi’s co-authored 2015 paper in Decision Sciences elaborates on the delicate balance between proactiveness and innovativeness within technology-based services firms. With too much proactive change agency, strategy execution (which contributes to innovativeness) suffers. Joshi found that a formalized organizational structure can moderate the tensions between these two factors, while helping firms reap more innovative benefits from risk-taking.

Most recently, Joshi has been looking at how entrepreneurship education can be most effective in driving students’ behavior once they graduate, especially for groups that have been historically excluded from entrepreneurship. His co-authored 2022 paper in Journal of Enterprising Communities suggested a new potential method to narrow the well-established gap in “entrepreneurial intention” between male and female students. He found that for entrepreneurship students from four universities in India, entrepreneurial intention was linked to a sense of career-readiness. Where that sense was present, the gender gap in intention disappeared.

Career readiness (“a proxy for confidence,” as Joshi terms it) is emotional and subjective, and is not something that can be learned from a book. Therefore, Joshi advises policymakers and pedagogues, “Just classroom education is not enough…If educators want to create an entrepreneurial mindset free of gender bias, they have to create an environment where there are co-curricular activities like pitch competitions and site visits.”

Toyah Miller

TOYAH MILLER
Professor, Management
Serving as research director for the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Toyah Miller is a leading thinker in the burgeoning field of social entrepreneurship research. Where the standard entrepreneur strives simply to maximize profit, social entrepreneurs attempt to solve a difficult social problem while keeping their business viable. Miller’s published research delves into the unique motivations and challenges involved in social entrepreneurship.

In a 2013 paper for Academy of Management Review, Miller theorized that compassion and caring served as a joint catalyst for social entrepreneurship activity, and thus not all entrepreneurs fit the mold of rationally self-interested businesspeople. Although her view validates entrepreneurs seeking to make the world a better place, it also suggests that the primacy of “heart over head” could lead social entrepreneurs to take on undue business risks.

In an ongoing research study, Miller looks at how the idealism of entrepreneurs affects their crowdfunding pitches to potential investors. Surveying more than 200 Kickstarter creators, she finds that idealistic creators posted fewer informative updates on their campaign pages, and as a result were less likely to get funded. In Miller’s view, this provides yet more evidence of heart-based entrepreneurs making sub-optimal choices, in this case by overestimating potential backers’ willingness to help and underestimating their need to be convinced.

Cognitive biases such as idealism are not limited to entrepreneurs. Another one of Miller’s in-progress studies examines the types of feedback given to start-up founders within accelerators and incubators. Generally, entrepreneurs were more likely to take negative feedback on board when it came with concrete recommendations. When feedback was more abstract, urging change with no specific alternative mentioned, it was less influential on decision-making. Therefore, the framing of feedback could, in some cases, make the difference between success and failure for entrepreneurs whose venture is in need of a pivot.

Heather Vough

HEATHER VOUGH
Associate Professor, Management
One of Heather Vough’s chief research specialties is professional identity. Her 2023 paper for Academy of Management Discoveries considers the effects of entrepreneurship’s cultural centrality—as reflected in hit shows such as Shark Tank and movies like Wolf of Wall Street—upon actual practitioners’ sense of themselves.

Through multiple rounds of exhaustive interviews with 29 entrepreneurs from North America and Australia, the authors discovered that while founders readily self-identify as entrepreneurs, they are reluctant to present themselves as such in social situations. Instead, they will use substitute self-descriptors such as job titles or company names—basically, anything except “entrepreneur.”

Analyzing interview responses alongside existing research on professional identity, the authors posit that founders decline to call themselves “entrepreneurs” because: a) they fear they would be misunderstood; and/or b) they believe the label would make them seem unrelatable to nonentrepreneurs. In other words, the cultural and economic emphasis on entrepreneurship has backfired to an extent. By flooding the zone with misleading or ambiguous impressions (e.g., entrepreneurs are all rich Silicon Valley “bros”), entrepreneurship’s exponents have inadvertently turned the term into a social liability.

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Mason is No. 1 among public institutions for research performance in entrepreneurship

Colleen Rich — Wed, 01 Nov 2023 18:48:55 +0000

Mason is No. 1 among public institutions for research performance in entrepreneurship Colleen Rich Wed, 11/01/2023 - 14:48

George Mason �鶹�� is No. 1 among public universities for research performance in entrepreneurship, and No. 2 overall nationally, in the latest report from EduRank.

Students at work in the MIX. Photo by Evan
Cantwell/Office of �鶹�� Branding

The rankings were determined by analyzing 1.8 billion citations received by academic publications and the popularity of recognized alumni, according to EduRank’s website.

“There are so many ways to think about academia as being isolated and away from the real world,” said Stefanie Haeffele, a senior research fellow at Mason’s Mercatus Center. “But all of the departments and different programs at Mason are connected to how we understand people and interact in the world. It’s great to see the recognition and that intention leads to really good things.”

The ranking comes on the heels of a $50 million planned gift to Mason—the largest school naming gift in the history of the Northern Virginia-based university—to name the Donald G. Costello College of Business. The planned gift establishes an endowment that will provide scholarships to undergraduate and graduate business students to help them prepare for successful careers as entrepreneurs.

The ranking also coincides with the establishment of Mason’s new Entrepreneur-in-Residence program that will be housed at Fuse at Mason Square and bolster the startup market and opportunities in the Washington, D.C., area and across Virginia.

That rich environment of innovation is a main contributor to the university’s R1 designation from the Carnegie Classification of Higher Education as one the top research universities in the nation.

Harsha Rajasimha presented Jeeva Informatics at Mason's venture capital conference, Accelerate 2022, in October. Rajasimha took part in Mason's I-Corps program. Photo by Max Taylor Photography

It also fosters a business and entrepreneurship ecosystem at Mason that is committed to solving the world’s grand challenges by nurturing fearless leaders and thinkers.

Dynamic educational platforms in the School of Business include the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, which provides several ways for students to dig into entrepreneurship, from the theoretical to the experimental.

At the Mason Innovation Exchange (MIX), students, faculty, and staff can use makerspaces, media labs, and incubators. The National Science Foundation I-Corps program works on exploratory business ventures started by faculty, staff, students and recent alumni.

The Office of Research Innovation and Economic Impact has overall responsibility for Mason’s research enterprise and to support entrepreneurship and innovation. And the boots-on-the-ground Mason Enterprise in 2022 provided—mostly free of charge—40,000 hours of one-on-one counseling to 10,000 small businesses.

“A No. 1 ranking in this space is what’s possible when you have a president [Gregory Washington] and a vice president for research [Andre W. Marshall] who understand the importance of playing an economic development role in the region and the state,” said Paula Sorrell, who is associate vice president for innovation and economic development at Mason and oversees Mason Enterprise.

Research is the bedrock on which entrepreneurship is built, said Zoltan Acs, professor emeritus in Mason’s Schar School of Policy and Government and a renowned expert in the field.

The research can include the study of the cognitive nature of individual entrepreneurs and their companies, how entrepreneurship impacts employment and productivity, and how it impacts people’s lives.

“And if you really think about what [Mason] did in the classroom and in the laboratory in terms of research,” said Acs, now a research fellow at Mathias Corvinus Collegium in Budapest, who has written more than 200 articles and 30 books about his inquiries, “we were really an A or A-plus institution.”

Mason research includes reams of papers from faculty published in top journals such as Research Policy, Small Business Economics, Journal of Business Venturing, and Entrepreneurship and Regional Development.

“For entrepreneurship, innovation is very important, so we want to improve the area,” said Lei Gao, associate professor of finance in the School of Business, whose Mason research has been published in the Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Research Policy, and the Journal of Banking and Finance.

“Breakthroughs in technology and innovation are necessary to push a whole company to grow fast,” Gao said. “So what kind of factors lead to more effective innovation?”

Haeffele’s Mercatus research includes how communities respond and recover after disasters, and her paper, “Entrepreneurship During a Pandemic,” was published in the Journal of Law and Economics.

“The role of entrepreneurship in society matters,” said the Mason alumnus, MA Economics ’10, PhD Economics ’16. “To be at a place where we care about putting theory into practice, and being recognized for that, is really great.”

Learn more about Entrepreneur Opportunities at Mason

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Fairfax City and Mason come together to spur economic growth and student success

Colleen Rich — Mon, 02 Oct 2023 14:06:58 +0000

Fairfax City and Mason come together to spur economic growth and student success Colleen Rich Mon, 10/02/2023 - 10:06

Fairfax City mayor and George Mason �鶹�� alumna Catherine S. Read, BA ’84, and Mason's School of Business Dean Ajay Vinzé signed a partnership agreement on Oct. 2 aimed at promoting economic growth in the city while giving students access to experiential learning opportunities that will benefit local businesses and students.

Students get hands-on retail management experience at Fairfax Ace Hardware. Photo provided

This partnership will extend the walls of the business school’s classrooms into the local business community, by affording business students with the opportunity to learn and practice leadership skills across several industries in the “classroom beyond the classroom.”

“�鶹�� collaboration with the George Mason �鶹�� School of Business is about investing in our future, and being open to change and innovation,” said Read. “By welcoming Mason students and faculty into our business community, we’re bringing fresh faces and new ideas to city planning in support of our vision for a vibrant commercial district.”

“The School of Business emphasizes student experience and career readiness via public, private, and academic partnerships,” said Vinzé. “We see Mason as your hometown university, and this partnership is an exciting opportunity for us to invest in the growth and economic development of this wonderful city, while providing our students with a hands-on learning experience that will prepare them for successful careers in business.”

Experiential learning opportunities in Fairfax are expected to draw Mason students from each of the business school’s four centers of excellence—Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE), Center for Real Estate Entrepreneurship (CREE), Center for Retail Transformation (CRT), and the newly named Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting.

a CIE-led vendor management experience for students with retailers in the Old Town Fairfax Business Association (OTFBA)/FCED “Wander In” retail incubator,
a CREE site plan analysis for determining best use options of commercial real estate sites in the Northfax Small Area Plan and other areas of Fairfax City,
an in-store retail management experience with CRT students and Fairfax City retailers, and
a study by students from the Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting, in coordination with the Mason Enterprise Center, to identify ways to improve business outcomes for small business federal contractors.

“What makes this program unique among ‘classroom beyond the classroom’ partnerships is our collective focus on leveraging the short-term benefit of student employability into a longer-term relationship with our city and its business community,” said Christopher Bruno, executive director and CEO of FCED. “One of the reasons we decided to partner with Mason is its track record of driving economic growth in the region—close to 70% of its alumni live and work in a 50-mile radius of the Fairfax Campus—and the confidence that gives us that many of the relationships we form now with Mason students and alumni are going to serve as a magnet for new businesses in the future.”

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She has ideas to bring Mason and Fairfax City together

“You look at our downtown and where are the students, where is the activity, where is the energy?” said Catherine Read, the first Mason alum, and first woman, to be Fairfax mayor. "What kind of things can we do between the campus and the city? That’s what we should be asking ourselves."

Learn more about her plans >>

New Fairfax City Partnership with George Mason �鶹�� School of Business to Promote Economic Growth While Affording Student Access to Experiential Learning Opportunities

Marianne Klinker — Thu, 28 Sep 2023 12:42:44 +0000

New Fairfax City Partnership with George Mason �鶹�� School of Business to Promote Economic Growth While Affording Student Access to Experiential Learning Opportunities Marianne Klinker Thu, 09/28/2023 - 08:42

Fairfax City Economic Development and George Mason �鶹�� Come Together to Spur Economic Growth and Student Success Through Experiential Learning

Fairfax City, VA – Fairfax City mayor and George Mason �鶹�� alumna Catherine S. Read (BA ’84) and George Mason �鶹�� School of Business Dean Ajay Vinzé will sign a partnership agreement on October 2 aimed at promoting economic growth in the city while giving students access to experiential learning opportunities that will benefit local businesses and students.

Joining Mayor Read and Dean Vinzé for the signing ceremony, which will also include the presentation of a proclamation by the mayor, will be Fairfax City Government and Economic Development officials, along with George Mason �鶹�� School of Business leaders, faculty, staff, students, and alumni. “�鶹�� collaboration with the George Mason �鶹�� School of Business is about investing in our future, and being open to change and innovation,” said Mayor Read. “By welcoming Mason students and faculty into our business community, we’re bringing fresh faces and new ideas to city planning in support of our vision for a vibrant commercial district.”

FCED officials and representatives from the business school review the conceptual layout of the Northfax West development project.

“The School of Business emphasizes student experience and career readiness via public, private, and academic partnerships,” said Dean Vinzé. “We see Mason as your hometown university, and this partnership is an exciting opportunity for us to invest in the growth and economic development of this wonderful city, while providing our students with a hands-on learning experience that will prepare them for successful careers in business.” Experiential learning opportunities in Fairfax are expected to draw Mason students from each of the business school’s four centers of excellence—Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE), Center for Real Estate Entrepreneurship (CREE), Center for Retail Transformation (CRT), and the newly named Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting.

Students get hands-on retail management experience at Fairfax Ace Hardware.

With some programs already underway and additional planning discussions on the horizon, both sides are looking forward to expanding the current collaboration in the spring. Among the projects slated to launch are a CIE-led vendor management experience for students with retailers in the Old Town Fairfax Business Association (OTFBA)/FCED “Wander In” retail incubator, a CREE site plan analysis for determining best use options of commercial real estate sites in the Northfax Small Area Plan and other areas of Fairfax City, an in-store retail management experience with CRT students and Fairfax City retailers, and a study by students from the Greg and Camille Baroni Center for Government Contracting, in coordination with the Mason Enterprise Center, to identify ways to improve business outcomes for small business federal contractors.

Fairfax City Economic Development is a collaboration between the Fairfax City Economic Development Office and the Fairfax City Economic Development Authority, an independent agency administered by a commission appointed by the City Council to promote economic development activity within Fairfax. Fairfax City Economic Development helps attract businesses to the city, encourages and develops programs that foster connections between businesses, residents, and visitors of Fairfax, and spearheads innovative programs and strategies devoted to positioning Fairfax City as an ideal location to start, grow, and scale a business. It is a founding member of the Northern Virginia Economic Development Alliance. Learn more at fairfaxcityconnected.com.

George Mason �鶹�� is Virginia’s largest public research university. Located near Washington, D.C., Mason enrolled over 40,000 students from 130 countries and all 50 states for the fall 2023 semester. Mason has grown rapidly over the last half-century and is recognized for its innovation and entrepreneurship, remarkable diversity, and commitment to accessibility. Also in 2023, the university launched Mason Now: Power the Possible, a $1 billion comprehensive campaign to support student success, research, innovation, community, and sustainability. Learn more at gmu.edu.

Topics

Center for Retail Transformation

Center for Real Estate Entrepreneurship

Center for Government Contracting

Press Releases

Media Contacts

Chris Bruno
(703) 638-8031
christopher.bruno@fairfaxva.gov

Duane Bailey
(703) 283-2073
dbaile8@gmu.edu

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