Be a Bear From Anywhere: Episode 4, GPE Incubator Fund

October 3, 2024
Be a Bear From Anywhere

We sat down with Dr. Gary Carini, vice provost for Institutional research and professional education, and Dr. Cece Lively, director of portfolio management for Graduate Professional Education to talk about the brand new GPE Incubator Fund

 

WATCH HERE

 

Cole: Welcome everybody. Welcome back to Be a Bear From Anywhere. Long, anticipated, highly awaited. We've been away for a bit working on a big project, and I'm so excited to be sitting down today with Dr. Carini and Dr. Cece Lively to talk to you all about the brand new GPE Incubator Fund, an innovative fund that's going to inspire our program faculty and staff to create new, cutting edge programs all over the University. 

Dr. Carini, welcome back. It's good to have you here. Would you mind giving just a brief introduction who you are, who you are to GPE and what you do around here?

 

Dr. Carini: Absolutely. I am Gary Carini, serve as Vice Provost for institutional research and professional education. I'm sitting here with our team in Graduate Professional Education, or GPE, as we call it. I work with a wonderful team that has launched what we're about to talk about, the Incubator Fund, and I've been at Baylor for over 30 years. My faculty appointments in the business school, where I also teach Online and Executive MBA students.

 

Cole: Awesome. Thank you very much. And Dr, lively here, would you just give a brief introduction to your first time here? Let the audience know who you are and what you do. 

 

Dr. Lively You bet. Hi everyone, I am Cece Lively. I work in GPE as well, and my title is the director of portfolio management. So that means we have a portfolio of programs that are online or hybrid, and we get to work on maintaining those and growing those throughout the year. And then we also get the special privilege of launching new academic programs and initiatives, which is a whole lot of fun, and that's also part of the reason why we're here today.

 

Cole: Thank you so much, Dr. Lively. Dr. Carini, I'm going to throw it over to you, and I just want you to talk for a second: What is the incubator fund? How did it come to be here, and just how has it been in the works? What makes you most excited about this fund?

 

Dr. Carini: Yeah, there's, there's a lot there. So I appreciate the question. This is an exciting new launch, new venture for the University, and we're calling it an incubator fund, which is to encourage colleges and schools and departments to launch brand new degree certificate or stackable certificate programs. So we are incubating those. These are, these are new programs that show a lot of promise, a lot of demand in the market. We can meet students needs who are very, very excited about that and our role, it goes back to the core of what we do, which is what, what are people's dreams from a career perspective? And then how can Baylor participate in that, in helping people achieve their dreams that they have identified for themselves. 

So we get to do that with an incubator fund where we ask, from a process perspective, very briefly, for just an initial interest form, tell us about the concept, the idea, and then I have a faculty committee that will review it with staff, and then give feedback to the area that launched that saying, "Hey, we're interested in more information about that proposal. Let's have a full proposal which is more comprehensive," or "This doesn't look as promising as we'd like it to. So we'd like to encourage you to go in a different direction."

 

Cole: Thank you very much. When starting a new program, it's easy to say, "Well, I don't really think that's for me. I think that's above my pay grade." Dr, lively, would you talk to that a little bit? Who is this incubator fund for? What does it take to put in one of these submissions? And who's eligible to do that?

 

Dr. Lively: You bet. So we started the launch with academic deans and associate deans. We wanted to make sure we got the message out to them first. So we just said, "Hey, we're about to send out this really awesome opportunity to advertise this incubator fund. Here is what it stands for. Here's what we're looking for. Please encourage your your faculty, your chairs, to put something in." So for this interest form, we've asked for all kinds of folks to fill out the form, specifically academic chairs. We're looking for just really great innovative ideas. I think part of the university strategic plan is to call for the growth of graduate programs, and we want to be a part of that. We want to break down barriers so that funding is not necessarily a barrier anymore. We want to really encourage those great new ideas. So if you have a great idea and you are part of Baylor University, that's what we're looking for.

Cole: And if you do have one of those great ideas and you want to get in on the fun of the GPE Incubator Fund, you can go to baylor.edu/gpe and go over to our program development section of our website, and you'll find all the latest information on the incubator fund. I believe our first round of deadlines for the first round of funding is coming up in early November, and each year we'll update that and make sure that everybody is well aware of when to get their submissions in so they can get a part of the incubator fund here.

Shifting over into the long term of this incubator fund and growing the university. We've announced the new strategic plan of Baylor in Deeds, starting on a small scale. What is the vision for the fund? And just what inspired you all to generate this fund?

 

Dr. Carini: I think what inspired us there's more opportunities for Baylor to participate in the professional education space. And so we. Have incredible faculty, incredible staff, and current students are great. How can we build on our students? So from a from a university perspective, we want to grow graduate education, so that's a major growth area for the university, reflected in the strategic plan. And then we're prompted by thinking of a couple themes in the strategic plan, interdisciplinary studies. So looking across disciplines, emerging technologies, the technology, human interface, certainly healthcare, just to name a few areas that are mentioned in the plan. So the incubator fund would would prompt more programs, possibly those areas, and certainly we assess demand. What is the market for it? What is the job outlook for it? So that we can invest in areas that would be meaningful as people continue to progress in their careers?

 

Dr. Lively: Over the past year alone, there's been 20 new ideas that have come to GPE for new programs or certificates, and ultimately, these are great ideas, but one of the main barriers is always funding, right? So I'm really excited with the addition of this incubator fund, I really think we can break down that barrier to start new program development or to enhance existing programs. This basically takes that barrier of how do we launch this from dollar perspective and really focuses on the great ideas so that we can really fulfill this aspect of the strategic plan. Awesome.

 

Cole: Thank you so much. Thank you. Dr. Lively, and thank you, Dr. Carini for joining me today. For anybody that has any questions about the GPE incubator fund. You can either go to baylor.edu/gpe over to the program development section of our website, or you can also email gpe_incubator@baylor.edu, you will find links to our website and that email in the description below. We hope that you come and check us out. Email us if you have any questions at all. We love talking to y'all. We love talking about GPE and about the future of the university, and we can't wait to hear from everybody. Thank you all so much for joining us and sic 'em bears.