Campus & Community

Applications Open for 2024 Intelligence++ Innovation Showcase of Inclusive Design

Thursday, April 4, 2024, By Martin Walls

Applications are now open for the Intelligence++ Innovation Showcase, which takes place on Thursday, April 25, from 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in the first floor auditorium of the Nancy Cantor Warehouse, 350 West Fayette St., Syracuse.

The event will highlight undergraduate and graduate student teams from across campus who have created concepts for products, services and technologies that can assist intellectually disabled people and their families. A distinguished panel of experts will award a total of $2,500 for the best showcase ideas.

Students receive feedback during the 2023 competition

Students present their designed products, services or technologies that can assist intellectually disabled people and their families at the 2023 Intelligence++ Showcase competition. (Photo by Marilyn Hesler)

Students wishing to present should e-mail Donald Carr, professor of industrial and interaction design in the College of Visual and Performing Arts (VPA) and program coordinator, at dwcarr@syr.edu before April 15 to secure a spot and to receive showcase instructions.

The event is sponsored by Intelligence++, a collaboration among InclusiveU, a program of the Lawrence B. Taishoff Center for Inclusive Higher Education at the School of Education, VPA School of Design and Syracuse University Libraries. The event is open to students across campus, and all are welcome to attend the showcase.

Launched in 2020 through a generous donation by Gianfranco Zaccai ’70, H’09 and the Zaccai Foundation for Augmented Intelligence, Intelligence++ is an innovative, interdisciplinary initiative focused on inclusive entrepreneurship, design and community. The initiative is available to both undergraduate and graduate students from all academic disciplines, including students with intellectual disabilities. A key element of the initiative is a two-semester course (DES 400/600) that encourages students to work in teams to imagine and create products, devices, digital platforms and services for persons with disabilities, culminating in the spring showcase.

Intelligence++ centers around three main concepts:

  • Aspects of Design—once a specific need or opportunity is identified, student teams are supported by a group of experts to help develop a working prototype of their design. By taking a build-to-learn approach, students gain real-time feedback while continually evolving their design.
  • Understandings of Disability—including accessibility, disability rights and advocacy, disability history, language, disability culture, models of disability and inclusion.
  • Entrepreneurship—students learn to develop a commercialization roadmap that moves through problem solving, solution building, testing, iteration, lean business model development, team formation, finding advisors and strategic partners, developing a funding strategy and pitching for investment.

DES 400/600 is taught by Professor Carr, with support from Beth Myers, Lawrence B. Taishoff Associate Professor of Inclusive Education in the School of Education and executive director of the Taishoff Center. Linda Dickerson Hartsock, founder of Blackstone LaunchPad at Syracuse Libraries and strategic initiatives advisor with the Libraries, provides entrepreneurial support to teams.

In addition to the course and the annual showcase, students can seek funding to commercialize their ideas through Intelligence++ Ventures. Students from any school or college can apply for this funding, and they do not need to take DES 400/600 to apply. However, priority is given students working with research and commercialization programs such as the Blackstone LaunchPad, CASE, Couri Hatchery at the Whitman School of Management, Invent@SU, Innovation Law Center, Institute for Veterans and Military Families, Intelligence++, NSF I-Corps, The SOURCE and Syracuse Center of Excellence in Environmental and Energy Systems.

Intelligence++ Ventures funding supports specifically defined projects with clearly identified timeframes and outcomes that move a research project or venture toward proof of concept and commercialization. Funds assist tangible needs through four innovation phases: discovery, testing, building and launching to market.