Crisis Management As part of the experiential learning that takes place at MiddCORE, students were handed the roles of upper management of Toyota during the accelerator crisis. Mentor Gary Holmes, Principal at Gary Holmes Communications LLC, helped the students craft their crisis management techniques and then put them into action. Take a look at what happened. Idea Creation MiddCORE participants have the opportunity to create their own innovation during MiddCORE, called the Innovation Challenge. The Innovation Challenge also encourages students to reach out to the mentors that hold workshops during the program. As part of the idea development process, Lisa Condino (Teaching Artist and Regional Coordinator of VSA Vermont) and EJ Bartlett (Creative Director of EJ Creative) held a prototyping and idea creation workshop that helped students understand their ideas in a physical way. Social Entrepreneurship Challenge During MiddCORE January ’13, students were tasked with a challenge related to…

On Tuesday, MiddCORE headed up to Vermont Public Radio for a field trip to work with Jane Lindholm, host of VPR’s noontime Vermont Edition, on the interviewing process. The show seems to run effortlessly, but students soon learned that behind the scenes an orchestrated team fields calls, sets up questions, and feeds IM messages to Lindholm all as she articulates thoughtful questions and listens to the interviewee and callers. After Lindholm wrapped up Tuesday’s Vermont Edition on revenue generated from break open tickets, rodent poisons, and curling, she spent about two hours helping MiddCORE students understand what makes for a good interview. She demonstrated an interview with Hugh Marlow, and the students had the opportunity to dissect and discuss the process. Lindholm also talked to MiddCORE students about the most relevant interview they often face: the job interview. Her number one suggestion for all interviewees is to be honest….

The last week of MiddCORE is an exciting time for students and mentors alike.  As students polish and refine their presentations for the Innovation Challenge and reflect on their experiences from the past month, they are also afforded a rare opportunity to meet with influential leaders and change makers from across the country. On February 1st, students and mentors gathered together in Kenyon lounge for a leadership summit and final celebratory dinner.  During the summit, students had the opportunity to pose questions to an incredible assembly of leaders: Ronald Liebowitz, president of Middlebury College; Jim Douglas, former governor of Vermont; Marna Whittington, Chief Executive Officer at Allianz Global Investors Capital LLC; Brian Napack, senior advisor of Providence Equity and Chastity Lord, Chief External Officer of Achievement First. Below are a few questions and responses from the night’s discussion: What one thing would have been most helpful to know before…

“You are the instrument: your body, your voice- and today is about tuning that instrument.” MiddCORE persuasive communication educator Mike Kiernan opens. Today students worked to explore more of their natural style in persuasive communication. Working with text developed in the class, students examine the art of connecting: it is all about moving from Self-Consciousness to Other-Consciousness. Everything about the design and delivery of a presentation should be centered on an understanding of the perceptual apparatus and the psychological state of your listener.

“At IDEO we create impact through design. I want you to experience the way IDEO works by doing it,”  Tom said. Tom Raith, the Creative Director at IDEO, spent a day with MiddCORE students in Monterey brainstorming and re-framing the Fort Ord Social Challenge that the students there are focusing on for the month of MiddCORE. Using the photos and quotes from the day in the field, the students covered the walls with sticky notes looking for impressions that stuck and recurrent behavioral models.  Were the stakeholders open, confrontational, or engaged? Even before MiddCORE Monterey started on January 2nd, 17 students interviewed stakeholders about a connectivity challenge in the Fort Ord area.  The challenge had been framed around a connectivity issue; however, with Tom’s guidance, students started to reframe the question starting with three words: “How might we …?” From there, students jumped to prototyping. “This helps to scratch…

Whether it’s developing sweet savories from local producers or creating energy bars made out of crickets, MiddCORE 2012 Alumni are continuing to further their enterprises that launched almost a year ago in MiddCORE during the Innovation Challenge! Read about Suzanne Calhoun of Suzanne’s Sweet Savories in the Addison Independent, who has packaged and sold hundreds of jars of savory spread. You can also read about Alex Bea’s mission to fight world hunger via his company Jiminy in the Middlebury Campus. Keep up the good work!  

Mark your calendars: the application for MiddCORE at Sierra Nevada College will be available on November 15th! We invite students and recent graduates from any institution to apply to join us this summer on Lake Tahoe. As the application opening draws nearer, our Outreach Assistant Astrid is getting ready to travel to colleges all over the country to recruit prospective students. She will lead information sessions about MiddCORE SNC and conduct interviews for interested candidates. Stay tuned for an info session on your campus! You can read the full press release from Middlebury College here.

This fall MiddCORE hosted four fabulous workshops: Persuasive Communication, Storymaking, Negotiation, and Activating Empathy (co-sponsored by the Center for Social Entrepreneurship). We were blown away by the mentors that led mini-MiddCORE sessions this fall, but don’t take our word for it! See what our participants had to say…  ”Could this workshop be offered again? Or on a more permanent basis?” “That type of learning is exactly what I’ve been yearning for at Middlebury…” “Really fascinating and interesting learning experience!” “MiddCORE seems like the missing piece that I have been searching for in my Middlebury education – and I know I would be lucky to be able to be a part of the program this January.” Peter DiPrinzio ’13 competes with Jake Nonweiler ’14 in an arm wrestle as part of Paul Cramer‘s workshop on negotiation.

Laura Fitton, Marketing Evangelist at Hubspot shared this bit of advice during our last stop at the inbound marketing firm in Cambridge, MA. Fitton, also known as @Pistachio, authored Twitter for Dummies and has influenced thought leaders like Guy Kawasaki, Seth Gowdin, Penelope Trunk and others on the benefits of using twitter. Here are some snippets of wisdom from @Pistachio on tweeting and inbound marketing strategies: “Influence (was) attract attention to yourself.  Influence (is) provide attention and value to others.” “Make your customer the hero of your story.” MiddCOREplus Students outside of HubSpot. After touring HubSpot, talking with @Pistachio, and meeting with the Talent Management Executive David Fernandez, students sat in the audience during HubSpot’s filming of their weekly marketing update.  The topic – Sexting Redefined and McHonesty Wins the Day.

Jo Opot ’05 Global Vice President of Business Development at TerraCycle and Freeman White ’03, CEO of Launcht challenged students to identify wastestreams on campus.  Groups identified, solo cups, paper towels, printer cartridges and plastic bags as main wastestreams. The winning team identified two prevalent discarded items on campus and included an additional item to to help market the Sin Bin.  Sin Bin is a collection mechanism for Solo cups, candy wrappers and condom wrappers.  This group even applied for an environmental life grant before their presentation on Friday!  After the awards, MiddCORE students sketched out an implementation plan for a Terracycle committee on campus.  Members of the committee would include staff from facilities, environmental organizations on campus, members of the residential life team and MiddCORE students.      

1. Package your points – make them presents, keys, gems, secrets 2. Expand your consciousness – speaking is listening 3. Less is more – make intentional choices and stay away from visual clutter 4.  Surprise me – trick me, say it’s going to be three secrets and then give me four