2015 NU Scramble™ @ The Garage

2015 NU Scramble™ @ The Garage


The training-grounds for student innovators, founders, & collaborators. 

The inaugural 2015 NU Scramble™ @ The Garage aims to deliver the fastest, most immersive on-campus student founder and innovator training in the world. Attendees join teams and dive into a field-tested, rapid venture development experience that fits weeks worth of lessons learned into 2 days.

At the Scramble™, you’ll flex your ability to turn crowd-sourced pitches into prototypes in cross-discipline teams. Along with good eats, Saturday and Sunday  include skill-building sessions, expert coaching modules, and the Final Demo to an esteemed panel of NU community experts.

Scramble alumni (some of whom include founders of Imperfect Produce, Lumos, One Degree, & Six Foods) have gone on to:

+ Top accelerators in the US (Techstars, Y Combinator, & 500 Startups)
+ Land jobs and internships via the Scramble™ network.

+ Win campus and national challenges & competitions.
+ Receive millions in investor funding.+ Apply Scramble-tested skills and concepts to strengthen the student-led campus innovation network.

The Scramble™ is NOT A HACKATHON, but an immersion designed to condense an early-stage launch process so you can identify and overcome major pain points and bottlenecks to personal and venture success. Prepare to build, learn, eat, and demo alongside NU's most dedicated and entrepreneurially-minded students.

The Startup Scramble™ Experience

• Open Pitches (high-tech to no-tech)

• 3 Team Deliverables

• 3 Skill-Building Sessions - Rapid Venture Modeling, Legal Stuff for Student Founders/Innovators, & Scramblytics™

• 18-page Personal Scramblytics™ Performance Report ($400 value)

• 3-Hour Expert Coaching Rotation

• Expert Panel Demo Showcase

• Meals included



AGENDA

Day 1: Saturday
8:00 am – Welcome, Breakfast, Kickoff & Keynote
9:00 am – Pitch Session & Team-Up
11:45 am – Deliverable #1 & Lunch
12:15 pm – Skill-Building Session (Venture Modeling/Legal Stuff for Innovators/Founders)
2:00 pm – Venture Building with expert Coaching Session
4:00 pm – Prototyping & Venture Building
6:00 pm – Dinner
7:30 pm – Deliverable #2
9:00 pm – Prototyping & Venture Building (to close)

Day 2: Sunday
9 am – Arrive & Team Check-In
9:15 am – Skill-Building Session
10:00 am – “Brunch and Build”
12:00 pm – Prototyping & Venture Building
2:00 pm – “Linner & Launch”
3:30 pm – Final Panel Showcase
5:30 pm – Wrap-Up and Experience Assessment

*Times change as needed.



FEEDBACK
The 2015 NU Scramble™ @ The Garage is designed to make highest and best use of the time you invest. Past Scramble™ teams have piloted social enterprises, demo’d education and personal lifestyle mobile apps, and modeled health and life sciences startups. The Scramble forged hundreds of new cross-campus relationships as attendees test-drove ideas and prototypes for potential growth. 

Scramble alumni had a few things to share:

“Prior to this experience, I’ve had a huge mental block, thinking that I would need to capture a perfect idea before getting started. At the Scramble, the experience of failing and refining was really beneficial from a personal development standpoint.”


“Recognizing that similar to the real-world, perseverance matters. It was also wonderful to push ourselves beyond our comfort zones.”


“[I learned] How to approach a pitch and build a pitch deck [and] tools/resources available to prototype/ launch web businesses. Developing a good idea is hard, executing is even harder.”


“The Scramble experience was great – amazing to experience the assimilation of new ideas, structuring and development of epic ideas in such a short span of time.”


“Met and worked with incredible people. Learned about new software and websites—immensely useful for my future.“‘


“Getting to connect with people from across campus was the best part! I even connected up with other people to pursue different start-ups that we plan to work on after this weekend.”


“This is what I always imagined college and grad school would be like — collaborating with people with different interests from across the university. I’ve learned things you definitely don’t learn in medical school, and I’ll be back next year.”


“Best use of $ in a long time. I don’t believe that, in terms of this project, my time could have been used more effectively.”


“This was a great opportunity to connect and see what people are doing around the Harvard community. It was a great way to collaborate and work on a shared project.”


“This was my first real introduction to the complete start up process. From the discovery to the business plan. I learned a lot and hope to continue with our project.”


“Definitely valuable! An amazing bootcamp that enabled us to develop skills in taking an idea from initial pitch, to team building, to design, to final pitch, peppered up with valuable coaching time, personal / team analytics and input from [a] championship panel.”

SCRAMBLE FACULTY
Coaches, panel members, and guests have represented organizations as diverse as:

FAQs

Who should attend a Scramble™?
Undergraduates, graduate, PhD, and postdocs seeking to develop and refine their startup and innovation skills enrolled in any of Northwestern’s 12 Schools. 

Whether you are brand new to the student startup/innovation scene, you have an idea to share and are seeking teammates, or you are interested in stepping up your collaboration game, you’ll find the Scramble™ immensely helpful.


Please note this event is for Northwestern students only. We check attendee registration at the door. Bring a printed or smartphone copy of your EventBrite registration and Northwestern student ID. Attendance will be limited to registered guests and tickets will not be available at the door.

What should I bring?
1. Laptops w/ charger

2. Phone w/ charger

3. Pen & notebook

4. Reusable water bottle (eco-friendly)

5. Pre-design your own lanyard (not required)

6. Props (i.e. helmets for Xtreme coding, costumes, personal mascots, etc.) for inspiration, motivation, & feel-good entertainment.

*All campus policies apply.

Do I have to pitch an idea? What if I don’t have an idea?
We believe it’s important to bring a few ideas to share even if you aren’t interested or committed to pursuing those ideas. Ideas are the currency through which you transact initial introductions and build relationships with fellow attendees. You encounter new challenges, problems, and questions everyday – these are all potential ideas to pitch. You have ideas.

What about sharing ideas?
The Scramble embrace an open and free-flow exchange of ideas, interests, and efforts. The Scramble is not an ideal venue to share or develop proprietary products and services unless you take proper measures to protect intellectual property (IP) before attending. If you intend to pitch an idea that is potentially proprietary or confidential, consult an attorney prior to attending or simply do not pitch the idea. 

All pitches and efforts are considered “open source,” which means any idea shared by Attendees at the Scramble goes into a common pool of ideas and prototypes that can be freely licensed by anyone--ANYONE. If this is a concern, have a strategy to approach this situation prior to attending. Here's the flipside: After the Scramble, you can continue refining the concept into proprietary IP. If you decide not to pitch an idea, focus your efforts leading up to the Scramble on creating a personal learning agenda – do you want to test-drive coding or app prototyping technologies? Do you need to brush up on your presentation or project management skills?

More Questions?

Email Stephen at: STEPHEN [@] SCRAMBLESYSTEMS.COM.