Stories & Updates

For many, the last year spent in school is a daunting, anxious ordeal filled with uncertainty about the next step in life. Sam Stokes, Entrepreneurship & Technology Innovation (ENTI), Class of 2018, was no different, but rather than go through the motions of finding a job to start down a career path she didn’t deeply care about, as many of her friends were doing, Sam spent her final year in school searching for her higher purpose and deepest interests and passions. Now, Sam operates a location-independent lifestyle business that provides web design services for small businesses and solopreneurs who want more from life.

The Summer Founders teams convened one last time on Tuesday, August 20, at the Venture Development Center for the 2019 Demo Day. The eight startup teams worked diligently all summer on their respective ventures, and each was able to showcase that hard work through their individual presentations. Along with the Summer Founders teams, the Venture Development Center was filled with potential investors, UD alumni, and other members of the Horn Entrepreneurship community.

It took 27 years for Michael Friedenberg, President of News and Media Operations for Reuters, an international news organization, to return to UD for a visit. The Entrepreneurship Club, a student-run organization supported by Horn Entrepreneurship, invites entrepreneurial alumni and community members to share their insights with students on a weekly basis during Free Lunch Friday. Michael shared Reuters’ views on freedom of the press in international spaces and why factual based reporting is important.

ChaCha Hudson started The SEWcial Cafe, a community sewing space for women to create, collaborate, and develop handmade products in a relaxed and inspiring environment that encourages innovation with in October 2018. Now almost a year on from launching, and ChaCha wants to bring her unique value of sewing expertise with strong community building practices to other women across the world. 

Winners of the Hen Hatch competition were announced during its final round on Tuesday, April 30 at the Queen in Wilmington, Delaware.

Vince DiFelice, Senior Instructor of Practice and Faculty Director of Venture Support, has been an instrumental figure in helping nascent student startups find their footing and future success. Beyond delivering exceptional venture support guidance, Vince has helped students find new passions and recalibrate their career goals to better match what they are most interested in.

Jason Aviles, the serial social entrepreneur behind such projects as FLYOGI and Artist Ave Station, as well as Project Director of Wilmington Green Box and Executive Director of Wilmington Placemakers Inc., is the current Social Entrepreneur in Residence at University of Delaware.

Jason Bamford recognized a need for a more immersive experience in entrepreneurial education at the University of Delaware and three months after a compelling conversation with Vince DiFelice, the Horn Entrepreneurship Summer Founders pre-accelerator program was born.

Social entrepreneurship is the new wave of creating socially impactful value from entrepreneurial ventures. Famous social ventures, like Toms and Warby Parker, have become immensely popular with the Millennial generation, both in sales and in career aspirations: Millennials want to make a meaningful impact at work.

Ted Foltyn, an adjunct faculty member at the University of Delaware and the Horn Entrepreneurship Signature Internship Coordinator, graduated from the University in 1981. The Denville, New Jersey native spent 25 years with Johnson & Johnson and remembers seeing George Thorogood and The Delaware Destroyers play stage side in his time with the student radio, WXDR. Ted sat down with the Horn Entrepreneurship media team to discuss his biggest takeaways from his time at UD and in his successful career.