Sierra Nevada College and Middlebury College are partnering for the second year to bring the nationally recognized MiddCORE program to the SNC campus.

Fifty-four students from colleges and universities throughout the United States, including students representing 13 countries and 17 states, arrived on the SNC campus June 1 for the four-week, intensive cutting-edge experiential learning program

Colleges represented include, among others: Middlebury, SNC, Dartmouth, Amherst, Bowdoin, Bates, Johns Hopkins and Barnard/Columbia.

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MiddCORE is designed to hone students’ abilities to develop innovative solutions to real-world problems.

Working in teams, students respond to challenges posed by CEOs and leaders of businesses and nonprofit organizations, create innovative solutions to actual problems, gather information and feedback to test the feasibility of their ideas, and then submit solutions to the CEOs for consideration.

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Each student also undertakes an Individual Innovation Challenge over the course of the four weeks that entails developing a commercial or social innovation — a new good or service, a new way to deliver an existing good or service, or the solution to a social problem.

“Nothing is more important and lasting than helping a young person learn how to take an idea to action, to develop their thinking and the skills that will determine whether or not they will be someone who can get things done in the world,” said SNC President Lynn Gillette.

MiddCORE students will present preliminary versions of these ideas-in-formation during an Innovation Challenge: Idea Fair to be held at SNC on Monday, June 23, from 9:30 a.m. to noon.

Community members are invited to serve as mentors, meeting individual students in the informal setting of the Idea Fair, hearing their ideas and pitches, and providing feedback, which will help students refine their ideas prior to formal presentation to an outside panel of judges at the conclusion of the program.

MiddCORE Director and Professor of Economics at Middlebury, Dr. Jessica Holmes, encourages the public to attend the Idea Fair,

“Students learn to present and test their ideas best in community; knowing how to incorporate feedback and learn from others is an essential skill and critical to success,” she said.

For more information, contact Deborah Prout at 775-881-7559 or dprout@sierranevada.edu.