Lean Lab announces new, mature fellowship class
June 18, 2015 | Andrea Essner
The Lean Lab, an education innovation incubator, announced its second cohort of fellows who hope to bring meaningful change to Kansas City education.
In the 2015 class, 10 fellows with seven solutions for Kansas City’s urban education will be participating in the Lean Lab’s summer program.
Fellows arrive at the program with ideas in various stages of development, Lean Lab co-founder Katie Boody said. Boody, a former middle school teacher, identified this year’s cohort as a group with advanced solutions.
“Fellows have been working on their solutions for a little bit longer,” she said. “It’s not just the idea stage.”
Lean Lab fellows participate in a month-long incubator program, which began Tuesday. During the summer program, fellows engage in a process of innovation that involves rapid prototyping and testing of their solutions to a problem in Kansas City education.
This year’s group is taking a closer look at how to help youth in education.
“These are direct initiatives that are impacting students,” Boody said. “They’re already taking on really big problems and I’m really excited to see where they end up.”
An important component of the incubator is building partnerships, Boody said. Fellows receive mentorship from the creative professional in Kansas City, and have the opportunity to pilot ideas at schools or programs once they’ve been refined in the incubator.
Fellows will pitch their solutions at a culminating event, Launch Day, July 17.
Learn more about the Lean Lab with this video from our media partner, Kansas City Public Television:
Featured Business
2015 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Una Mas Empanadas folds authentic Argentinian flavors into new restaurant spot at Parlor
Expanding Silvia Herrera’s business from a food truck in Gardner to one of Kansas City’s most active and eclectic food hubs brings the Buenos Aires-born entrepreneur — and her grandmother’s 50-year-old handcrafted empanada recipe — to an even wider, more diverse audience, she said. “Our empanadas are more than just food,” Herrera said. “They represent…
It’s not too late to preserve KC’s Black-owned restaurants (or to enjoy Black Feast Week)
The recent closures of Soiree, The Krave, and Privee — Black-owned restaurants that each became a staple of Kansas City’s evolving food scene — leave a clear void that can’t be ignored, said Ryan Sorrell. An initiative to help save local culinary should-be hotspots in similar danger wraps this week, but the work to promote and…
Ancestry.com founder-turned-AI evangelist says rapidly advancing tech can uplift humanity, families
People across the globe are caught in an internet malaise, said Paul Allen, and tech visionaries’ response should be to renew humans’ dependence on faith and family and friendship and local community. One of their most critical tools, he said: decidedly non-human solutions from the rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence. Allen — founder of…
KC filmmaker sees pleasure as a prequel to dystopia hiding ‘In Plain Sight’; His brave new wake-up call
Thomas Rex’s new proof-of-concept film project envisions a near-future world where society is on the verge of totalitarian control, he said, describing a cautionary tale about being unknowingly controlled by a culture of escapism through pleasure and pharmaceuticals. “In Plain Sight” serves as a prelude to Aldous Huxley’s novel “Brave New World,” an acclaimed but…