One cold morning in January, Innovation and Design Experience for All (IDEA) director and Professor of Psychology Alison Butler, Ph.D., made a promise to the more than 1,100 first-year and transfer students gathered for the program’s opening ceremony. The next three days, she told them, would be the foundation for a lifetime.
“Bryant IDEA is about sparking innovation and opening the door to what's possible,” Butler said.
Now in its 14th year, IDEA provides students — guided by faculty, staff, and student mentors — with a design thinking crash course that prepares them to turn big ideas into creative, world-changing action.
“Those who came before you have leveraged their IDEA experience to work on issues they care about, uncover innovative solutions, and make valuable contributions to their workplaces and communities,” Bryant President Ross Gittell, Ph.D., shared with the students in his opening remarks. “It will do the same for you.”
The more than 50 IDEA student mentors in the audience had already seen how far design thinking can take them. Pratham Patel ’27, for example, used IDEA’s problem-solving approach as a Textron intern. Satanvi Kavali ’27 used its focus on empathy to assist the nonprofit Social Enterprise Greenhouse. Adrian Nunez ’27 employs IDEA concepts in Bryant’s Microbial Glycobiology lab.
And they were all eager to share what they had learned.
Gaining perspective
Each cohort of IDEA students was assigned a different real-world problem or “challenge” — from reimagining manufacturing workflows in the age of AI to finding ways to support young adults struggling with mental health issues — and set to work finding creative solutions. Site visits to locations around the state, sponsored by AAA Northeast, helped them gain a fuller sense of their challenges.
Empathy interviews provided them with the opportunity to speak with people who would be directly affected by their ideas. For Cohort 22, tasked with finding ways to improve the Bryant Athletics game-day experience, that meant engaging with a trio of Bulldog “superfans.”
Kristen Hayes ’16, a former track and field athlete, Kevin Lavalla ’78, an attorney who has attended thousands of games with his son, Bryce, and Liz Magee ’19 fielded questions and took part in breakout chats with students, discussing both the things they thought Bryant Athletics is doing well and areas for improvement.
The students used their input to start making their own connections. “We’re seen growth in the population of students attending games, but it’s still not what it should be,” said cohort member Emily Canseven ’29, a goalkeeper on the women’s soccer team, as she considered new approaches.
“Hearing the solutions these students are offering up is really going to help bolster our staff’s creativity,” said Mikey Calabrese ’23MBA, director of compliance for Bryant Athletics, who served as a mentor for the cohort.
Discovering possibility
In Day 2’s brainstorming workshop, sponsored by Fidelity Investments, the students began to take what they had learned and bring it to bear. Biological and Biomedical Sciences Adjunct Professor Sandi Brenner’s pupils in Cohort 30, who focused on veterans' wellness, gathered in the Unistructure’s hallways to write potential answers to ‘how might we’ questions on a large sheet of paper taped to the wall. Their queries spanned from, ‘How might we boost confidence levels in VA care’ to ‘How might we connect vets to resources.’
Their ideas came fast and furious. Wanting to provide structure to veterans during their transition to civilian life, one group considered strategies like holding a Bingo night, going on a fishing charter, or creating a veterans’ lounge. Feverishly writing, they attempted to generate as many ideas as they could in 10 minutes before repeating the ideation process two more times with different questions.
Brenner, going group to group, challenged the students to come up with their most “out there” imaginings — even ones they considered unconventional or absurd.
“Sometimes out of these wild ideas you’ll generate real solutions,” she said.
Taking a second look
There was a buzz in the room as Cohort 40, who were challenged with expanding childhood literacy, prepared to present their ideas to some special visitors: Elissa Tracey ’00, ’03MBA and Jordan Grady ’25 — two of the more than 100 Bryant alums who returned to campus to help out with IDEA. The pair spent the pitch session listening, asking questions, and helping the students hone their game-changing plans.
“Who’d like to go first?” faculty mentor Karen Maguire asked — and a forest of arms went up on the behalf of eager teams. Alex Spaulding ’29’s group was determined to have been the fastest, denoting a confidence in their plans.
But it’s different to present them, he admitted. “When you say the words out loud, it becomes a lot more real.”
When it was their turn, Aubrey Anderson ’29’s group grilled Tracey about her time as a school board member on the curriculum committee. Every detail matters, they reasoned.
After the session concluded, Josiah Johnson ’29 was thoughtful. “It was a great experience” working with the alums, he reflected. Their help highlighted how far the students had come — and how far they’re still able to go.
A new beginning
Finally, after more than two days of empathizing, defining, ideating, prototyping, and testing, it all came down to one last pitch. As the undergrads filed into the MAC gymnasium, four IDEA cohorts — selected as finalists from a massive “Innovation Exhibition” — gathered stage left for their final presentation.
Their three-minute pitches covered a variety of fields, but they were all ground-breaking — ranging from an AI system that would enhance company communication and productivity to a remotely-controlled ball that would allow dog owners to play with their furry friend when they’re away to a coffee shop designed with different zones (quiet, quick, relax, and social) for individuals’ moods/needs to glasses for live theater that displayed closed captioning and translated shows into different languages.
Following the demonstrations, the competition’s judges, Trustee Professor of Management Mike Roberto, DBA, and Professor of Management Lori Coakley, Ph.D., selected the top two finalists. An audience vote chose Cohort 30, and their theater glasses concept, as champion.
But for the IDEA participants, the closing ceremony was just the beginning. “Don’t let this experience end here. Carry it into your classes, to your work, and to your lives,” Provost and Chief Academic Officer Rupendra Paliwal, Ph.D., urged the students. “Be curious, be bold. And when someone tells you, ‘That’s never been done before,’ don’t take it as a warning. Take it as an invitation — an invitation to ignite possibilities.”