Frequently Asked Questions
These two project formats appear similar on paper but are ultimately implemented very differently. Capstones, because of the small ratio of students to company, is a more intimate premium learning experience. It’s immersive, hands-on, and ultimately allows the students to develop personal relationships with their host company mentors.
On the other hand, Live Business Cases are designed for full academic courses or programs to take advantage of (typically 6-100 students). This high ratio of students to company is an extremely meaningful and relevant learning experience for students, but tends to be far less personal because of the few direct interactions and touch points with the company mentors.
Academic programs or students requesting collaborations with our host companies pay for engagements. We are an education company trying to help students experience the professional work environment through unique, challenging, and rewarding collaborations with industry partners.
EDUCATOR PRICING is available
STUDENT PRICING is available
CapSource uses a growing network of experienced curriculum designers turned project scoping experts. Our combined team uses tactics from management consulting firms and expert project management frameworks to ensure our projects are most likely to succeed. We also typically include insight from any university faculty that involved in planning the program and managing the project in order to confirm that it meets learning objectives.
Each Host Company assigns a 1 and 0 to the engagement that’s responsible for interfacing with the students on a bi-weekly basis. Projects are typically orchestrated so they can be completed remotely with little guidance from the host companies. Ideally, faculty mentors will also be involved to check-in and provide guidance where needed.
STUDENTS typically spend 10-15 hours per week on their experiential learning engagements.
COMPANIES usually need to allocate roughly 1-2 hours per week (including meeting with faculty and students and answering questions and information requests).
EDUCATORS need to spend 2-4 hours per week mentoring students and checking-in to ensure the best outcomes.
We vet our companies based on the quality of their leadership and their interest in getting involved in the education process through experiential learning collaborations. We have used a breadth of companies, including non-profits, high-growth startups, and Fortune 500s that vary in size, industry, products, and culture so that students can learn about a wide variety of work environments through our collaborations.
Projects can truly be based on any academic discipline or business function.
Please check out our PROJECT DEPARTMENTS if you’re interested in see examples.
We have experiential learning formats that are suitable for all undergraduate and graduate students. We can also tailor our experiences to young professionals and adult continuous learners.
We specialize in developing projects that align student competencies with learning objectives and company goals.
Check out our PRODUCTS PAGE to explore sample collaborations.
We encourage that companies meet with the students and/or faculty mentors (in-person or virtually) at least every other week for the duration of the project.
CapSource’s team has prepared a st andard Rules of Engagement in addition to our Terms of Service, which includes a st andard NDA and IP Assignment. This frames the engagement and establishes roles and responsibilities for the faculty, students, and companies that are involved with our projects.
This is a great question! We strongly believe that students wouldn’t be empowered to learn in such an experiential way without enlisting the help of real company professionals and their mosts up-to-date business challenges. For that reason, we ensure that in all circumstances, our host companies own the intellectual property outright. We appreciate that companies are willing to allocate time and resources to benefit student learning and hope that all of our participating students and faculty will do the same.
Typically Faculty Mentors are responsible for grading student outcomes. They often enlist help and coaching from the host companies, but ultimately the student grades come down to them.
We recommend reading our article: HOW TO GRADE PROJECT-BASED EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING COLLABORATIONS