The Peter T. Paul Entrepreneurship Center (ECenter) recently announced the creation of the J. Dolores and Alfred P. Maurice Prize for Innovation Fund. Alfred P. Maurice donated $150,000 to create an endowed gift to benefit undergraduate student innovation.
The ECenter is honored that Alfred Maurice sees the value in encouraging, supporting, and rewarding undergraduate students to be creative and innovative with ideas and solutions. This prize will help us continue to build the growing innovation culture on campus whether the student idea is a product, social venture, or service.
The ECenter is the hub of all things ideas, innovation, and entrepreneurship and open to all UNH Durham students from all colleges. This is the third such fund created at a university by Alfred Maurice.
Mr. Maurice stated, “The purpose of this fund is to encourage and foster innovation, creativity, originality, ingenuity, and resourcefulness in undergraduate students enrolled at the university. The fund establishes the Maurice Challenge and provides for the J. Dolores and Alfred P. Maurice Prize for Innovation. I am excited to see the outcomes from UNH students and excited to have the ECenter be the home of this prize also named for my wife, Dolores.”
The fund is expected to award its first prize of approximately $5,000 in 2018. All UNH undergraduate students are eligible to participate in the Maurice Challenge and receive the prize.
We are appreciative of the support by UNH Advancement in coordinating this funding. With innovation being one of UNH’s critical brand pillars, we know it takes a full team working together to have a strong impact on the students. The ECenter’s goal is to continue building the positive and supportive idea, innovation, and entrepreneurial culture at UNH, for all students, faculty, staff, researchers, and alumni. The ECenter has already established itself as the hub in its area on campus. Established ECenter programs include a Start-Up Speaker Series, three bootcamps centered around networking, marketing, and sales, a hackathon, one-on-one coaching, the $10,500 Summer Seed Grant, the $15,000 i2 Passport Program, and the Paid Internship at Start-Ups Program. Physical resources include co-working zones at Alpha Loft at the ECenter, the student run Makerspace, and the ECenter Caffeinator Coffee Bar.
For more information about all that the ECenter has to offer, including our full program schedule, please visit our website at unh.edu/ecenter. You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, and SnapChat at @UNHECenter.
Ian Grant
Director, ECenter
