{"id":16706,"date":"2016-10-17T12:41:07","date_gmt":"2016-10-17T17:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/?p=16706"},"modified":"2016-10-17T12:41:07","modified_gmt":"2016-10-17T17:41:07","slug":"the-unofficial-opening-of-in2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/2016\/10\/17\/the-unofficial-opening-of-in2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Unofficial Opening of IN2"},"content":{"rendered":"

A huge thank-you to Britta McKenna, Carl Heine, Kathryn Downey, Neil Patel, and Claudia Zhu for their time and insight. I\u2019ve learned that no matter what you\u2019re\u00a0<\/em>into, there\u2019s sure to be something for you at IN2.<\/em><\/p>\n

Numerous tarps. More construction workers. Wet paint smell. A huge, mysterious slab of wall opposite the auditorium.<\/p>\n

Everyone has walked past it several times over the course of the past year, questioning why the\u00a0Student Union was being torn down, but never thinking to ask what all the hype was about.<\/p>\n

Now, it is unofficially open! Meet IN2, the culmination of hard labor, countless blueprints, years of planning, and ambitious visions. \u201cFunded by Steve Chen [IMSA alumnus and co-founder of Youtube], it\u2019s the first innovation hub for high school students in Illinois, and as far as we know, in the country,\u201d said Claudia Zhu, board member of Teen STEM Caf\u00e9. IN2 is the center for inquiry and innovation (hence, IN2, pronounced \u2018into<\/em>\u2019), entrepreneurship, student-proposed projects, and so much more. \u201cIt\u2019s not a \u2018big fancy room\u2019\u2026 rather, IN2 is meant to provide a framework, the resources, and the guidance for people to do projects, discuss and develop startups\/products,\u201d Neil Patel said, board member of Club Terra, a club run through IN2.<\/p>\n

It all started three years ago when IN2 was envisioned by IMSA staff members Britta McKenna and Carl Heine. \u201cWe hosted intersessions where we traveled from coast to coast, starting with Silicon Valley and Stanford, to Chicago, Rockford, and Peoria\u2014I went to Boston myself\u2014to study the best practices from successful innovation centers in universities,\u201d Britta McKenna said, the director of IN2 and Chief Innovation Officer.<\/p>\n

Afterwards, IMSA students formed teams to design the IN2 space and hand-pick the technology and the furniture. \u201cWhat you\u2019re seeing today is IN2 imagined through a student\u2019s lens,\u201d Britta McKenna said. Through our imaginings of an innovation center reflective of the 21st<\/sup> century, we\u2019ve upheld our classic mission statement of advancing the human condition.<\/p>\n

But first came IN1, the minimum viable product! Complete with cool gadgets and innovative technology like 3D printers and Google Cardboard, IN1 was developed as a prototype for testing out ideas.<\/p>\n

\u201cIN1 was the \u2018incubator space,\u2019 and we wanted it to be bursting at the seams with projects and ideas, so we could grow into this space,\u201d Britta McKenna said, gesturing toward IN2. Now, in 2016, Betty Hart, IN2 program manager, organizes all of the student-led clubs and programs that are run from IN2: Teen STEM Cafe, MakerSquad, Club Terra, TALENT (& eleMENT), various launchpads like DropDot and Virtual Reality, and even more. \u201cIN2 is doing this new thing called MakerMob, which is basically the ‘umbrella’ term for anything from submarine building to a 3D printing club. Aviation will be merged into this, and we teach people how to build and fly quadcopters,\u201d said Kathryn Downey, former board member of Aviation Club.<\/p>\n

The official opening (the ribbon-cutting ceremony) is projected to be this upcoming winter, but as any project with \u201cinnovative\u201d in its name, IN2 will never truly be finished, promises Britta McKenna.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not going to be limited to this space,\u201d said Carl Heine, the director of the TALENT program, on IN2\u2019s future. \u201cThis is a location, but the cool things will be the problems solved, new businesses started, the solutions found for the global grand challenges, and that\u2019s what\u2019s going to change the world.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A huge thank-you to Britta McKenna, Carl Heine, Kathryn Downey, Neil Patel, and Claudia Zhu for their time and insight. I\u2019ve learned that no matter…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":314,"featured_media":16707,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1019],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2601],"class_list":["post-16706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-imsanews"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/314"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16706"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16720,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16706\/revisions\/16720"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16706"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.imsa.edu\/acronym\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=16706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}