The First-Year Business Experience

Throughout this interactive semester-long course, first-year students are exposed to a variety of business concepts through hands-on coursework and research. Students are put in teams, assigned a specific company, and tasked to identify a sustainability issue within their assigned business. After defining the sustainability issue, students engage in a design sprint to develop an innovative solution.

Teams then present their findings in class and the winning team from each course goes on to present at the highly-competitive Top Dawg competition where they are judged by a team of business professionals. One team is crowned the overall winner and given the distinction of Top Dawg, while also receiving an automatic A+ on the course’s final exam.

At the end of the semester, students gain experience in ideation, diverging and converging ideas, creativity, innovation, and complex problem solving.

Current Student Story

“My favorite part about First-Year Business Experience was the collaboration with my group and the development of a new, theoretical business. We worked through problems as a team all while going through the processes of a start-up business. The emphasis on hands-on learning has prepared me for both academic and professional challenges ahead.”

Ella Junker
Entrepreneurship and Innovation major
Boulder, Colorado