Bachelor of Innovation Overview

The Program: The Bachelor of Innovation family of programs is an internationally unique interdisciplinary undergraduate program between the College of Engineering and Applied Science (EAS) and College of Business (COB). The Bachelors of Innovation (BI) is a family structure, much like a bachelor of science (BS) or a bachelor of arts (BA), in which particular majors are defined. Included Program/Tracks (in alphabetical order): BI in Business Administration with emphasis areas in each major business sub-area, BI in Computer Science, BI in Computer Science Security, BI in Electrical Engineering, and the BI in Game Design and Development. Each option in the program is composed of an emphasis major, an innovation core, and one of 4 cross-discipline cores. .

 

Student Outcomes: Beyond the already expected technical depth of a Bachelors student from University of Colorado, BI students will emerge with a unique set of experiential skills. This will include: Multi-year multi-discipline team experience working on real problems with local companies, an understanding and experience in the innovation process of transforming ideas into sustainable societal impact, an understanding of the basics of business, policy and intellectual property, and through their cross-discipline a deeper exploration globalization issues, creative communication, technology impact or business. The program will benefit both the business and science/engineering students as they learn to work together to solve problems.

Student Competitiveness:

A common question is whether these new degrees will be competitive in the market place. In building the program we did a detailed formal survey of 50 companies, across Colorado. When asked if they would agree with the statement I would generally choose a UCCS BI graduate over a BS/BA from other schools such as CU Boulder, the hypothesis was accepted at the very significant 99.95% (p=0.0005) level and when asked to agree with the statement I would be unlikely to hire a UCCS BI student the hypothesis was rejected at the very significant 99.998% (p=0.00002) level. These and other questions in the survey strongly suggests that the new BI degree students will be more employable than our current UCCS graduates, and that the new degrees will be accepted by industry. And if there is a company that does not know what the BI degree is, it is still a formal Bachelors degree in either engineering or business, as we did not change the name of the major, just the family.

 

Meeting a National Need: The National Academy of Engineering report on Educating the Engineer of 2020, the Council on Competitiveness, and the Business Roundtable all conclude that teaching about the innovation process and changing the education process, especially for engineering, is critical. The NAE states

Innovation is key there is an undercurrent of awareness that current complexities are so daunting that tinkering at the edgesreforming one course, one program, one department at a time, developing isolated instances of success here and there is no longer a viable response if we are to build the kind of robust programs in research and education now needed to strengthen the U.S. engineering community by 2020.

The need for a dramatic reform in engineering education is not something we are claiming, it is a nationally recognized need to which we are responding. The comprehensive nature of the proposed Bachelor of Innovation is directly in line with the NEA engineering 2020 guidelines. We are preparing students for the competitive environment in which they will explore their careers.

What is the Bachelor of Innovation?

The Bachelor of Innovation family of programs is an interdisciplinary undergraduate program between the College of Engineering and College of Business. The Bachelors of Innovation is actually a family structure, much like a bachelor of science or a bachelor of arts, in which particular majors are defined. Included Programs (in alphabetical order, click on any one to see its details)

 

Each major in the BI family of programs is composed of an emphasis major, an innovation core, a cross-discipline core, and the general education requirements:



The Innovation Core is 27 Credits, geared toward innovation and entrepreneurship; a key component is multi-disciplinary long-term team activities over the sophomore, junior and senior years. Teams are expected to include students from all years, and maybe even graduate students. The teams will have dynamic membership and team member roles will change on a regular basis. The innovation core includes an overview of innovation, a entrepreneurship, business and IP law, and policy courses. The students will develop an "innovation portfolio" throughout the program to help document and highlight their roles and contributions in these various courses. this during this time. This unique common core and experiential learning component are part of makes the Bachelor of Innovation family so unique.

Each major also includes a per-student choice of a Cross-discipline core , which is a coherent collection of 21 credits from one cross over area. The individual will choose this as early as possible in their program, but definitely before sophomore year.

Technology Core (for non-technology degrees) will provide a broad coverage of engineering and technology. These may be new courses (if resources permit) or may be a collection of existing introductory courses in engineering.

Business Core (for non-business degrees) will provide a broad coverage of business topics, likely to be based on the core business courses of marketing, management, finance and economics.

Globalization Core (for any BI major) will provide a selection of courses on internalization issues. It will have a language requirement (passing at the second year level) and a collection of international business/policy courses. It is being considered that students in this option should be required to demonstrate at least 3 months residence in a non-English speaking country, and a one-semester study abroad will be strongly encouraged. While abroad, involvements in the Innovation team projects will be virtual, but will be required.

Creative Communication Core (for any BI major) will provide coverage of a variety of communication mechanisms. These will be a collection of existing courses, including both traditional (e.g., oral communication) and non-traditional (e.g., visual arts) communication approaches.

UCCS is an NCA accredited university. The BI degrees have been designed, where appropriate, to be consistent with the appropriate specialized accreditation guidelines of AACSB or ABET . The College of Business is AACSB accredited so the BI in Business carries that automatically. However, no program can be ABET accredited until it graduates its first class of students and applies for ABET review. When that is granted it would be retroactive to the class reviewed.

Innovation and Cross Discipline Cores:

INNOVATION CORE (27 Credits)
Credits Course Identifier
3* INOV 101 The Innovation Process
3 ENTP 100 - Introduction to Entrepreneurship
3 INOV 201/202/301 Innovation Team, Reporting & Analysis(1 credit 3 terms) Meets with 302/401/402
6 INOV 302/401/402 Innovation Team, Design & Research (2 credits 3 terms).
3 INOV 210 Technical Writing, Proposals and Presentations
3 BUAD 400. Government, Law, and Society
3 BLAW 201 Business and Intellectual Property Law
3 PSC 498Public Management in Global Context (subject to change)

27

TOTAL

CROSS DISCIPLINE CORE BUSINESS (21 Credits)
Credits Course Identifier Note
3(6) ECON 101 and ECON 102 Engineering students must take both (but substitute their Prob/stat Class for QUAN 201)
3(0) QUAN 201 or equivalent Basic statistics class. Can substitute other statistics of equivalent math background (e.g. EE 3601, MATH 381)
3 ACCT 201 Introduction To Acconting
3 ORMG 330 Organizational Management
3 MKTG 300 Introduction to Marketing>
3 INFS 300 Introduction to Information Systems
3 FNCE 301 Finance for innovation (title subject to change)

21

TOTAL

 

CROSS DISCIPLINE CORE Engineering Technology (21 Credits)

 
Credits Course Identifier Note
3 ECE 1001 Intro to Robotics
3 ID 101-014 Introduction to Engineering Innovation (ITechKnow) (recently Introduced)
2 MAE 1503 Intro to Engineering Design
3 MAE 1502 Principals of Engineering
2 ECE 1411 Intro to Logic Circuits I
2 ECE 2411 Intro to Logic Circuits II
3 CS 110 Problem Solving through Game Creation
3 CS 115 Principles of Computer Science* (If the student is already taking INFS 300, they may substitute any other CS course for CS 115).

21

TOTAL

 

CROSS DISCIPLINE CORE Creative Communication (21 Credits)
Credits Course Identifier Note
3 Comm 201 Oral Communication in the Workplace
3 Lead 106 Leadership Communication
3 VA 101 Beginning Studio 2D
3 VA 104 Beginning Drawing
3 VA 210 Digital Imaging
6 Choose 6 credits from the list on right. Buad 390 Improving Personal and Team Creativity

Comm 102 Interpersonal Communication

Comm 328 Intercultural Communication

Engl 205 Introduction to Creative Writing Fiction

Engl 312 Technical Editing and Style

Psy 100 General Psychology

Psy 315 Psychology of Motivation

21

TOTAL

 


CROSS DISCIPLINE CORE GLOBALIZATION (21 Credits)

Draft

Credits Course Note
12 Foreign Language A working knowledge (grammar and conversation) of at least one foreign language; may be satisfied with 4 years of high school foreign language and passing second year proficiency test. If waived in whole or in part, student must substitute the credits from the list below or from other foreign language courses as approved by the advisor.
9 Choose 9 credits from the list on right. List is subject to change. ECON 328 International Political Economy
ECON 330 Environmental Economics
ECON 341 International Economics
ECON 366 Economics and Community Problems
ECON 371 Comparative Economic Systems
ECON 377 Economic Development
EST 200 Introduction to Ethnic Studies
EST 201 Introduction to Race and Gender
EST 323 The Chicana/o Community
EST 324 African American Community
EST 325 The Pre-History and History of Native American Cultures of the Southwest
EST 328 The Asian American Community
FCS 101 Selected Topics in Strategic Languages I
FCS 102 Selected Topics in Strategic Languages II
FCS 318 German and Austrian Civilization and Culture
FCS 322 Japanese Culture and Civilization
FCS 232 Southwestern Culture Studies
FCS 339 Internships in Foreign Cultures
GES 198 World Regional Geography
GES 199 Introduction to Human Geography
HIST 104 Modern Europe
HIST 111 Asian History: Southwest
HIST 112 Asian History: Indian Subcontinent
HIST 133 Asian History: China
HIST 114 Asian History: Japan
HIST 121 History of Middle East
HIST 141 Latin America Since 1810
HIST 351 Chicano History Since 1910
PSC 110 Introduction to Global Politics
PSC 311 Emerging Nations
PSC 322 Eastern Political System
PSC 413 Latin-American Political System
PSC 421 International Politics
PSC 422 Comparative Politics
PSC 425 International Law
PSC 442 Political Ideas
PSC 446 Administrative Law
PHIL 102 Ethics
PHIL 115 Ethics in Professions
PHIL 309 Philosophies of Asia
PHIL 416 Business and Management Ethics
PSY 345 Psychology of Diversity
PSY 393 Industrial and Organizational Psychology
SOC 111 Introduction to Sociology
SOC 220 Introduction to Racial and Ethnic Groups
SOC 222 Communities in a Global Environment
SOC 364 Sociology of Popular Culture
SOC 438 Globalization and Development

21

Total