Why Rutgers is the best place to build a company

The popularity of entrepreneurship is booming on college campuses around the country. It’s hard to walk ten feet on College Ave without seeing a sticker for a new app, being pitched the next Uber of X or hearing why some idea will “change the world.” Every college student seems to have some idea that they truly believe can make them a billionaire. Shark Tank has enabled everyone to believe that their idea is the next big thing.

Ivy League schools have long churned out entrepreneurs who went on to start massively successful companies like Facebook and Snapchat. The stories of Ivy drop-outs moving to Silicon Valley to build the future have made their stamp on Hollywood, with The Social Network (Sorkin, 2010) and “Silicon Valley” (HBO) showcasing the pinnacles and pitfalls of tech startups.

While Harvard and Stanford get all the shine, the best place to start a company might actually be on the banks of the Raritan, here at Rutgers. The three biggest reasons are fairly simple.

Diversity

It’s the word Rutgers slaps on every brochure about the school, but in terms of starting a company, diversity is one of the most crucial elements to success. The biggest pitfall in startups is building things that people don’t need. If you ask five of your friends if your t-shirt designs are cool and they all say yes, that’s not enough to start a clothing line. Get out of the bubble and talk to your fellow students in one of the most diverse student bodies in the nation.

At Rutgers, you have access to an ideal focus group. Thousands of students from every demographic attend this school and they are the ones you need to talk to. If your idea gets a positive response from students from many different walks of life, it might be time to take that idea and build it into a real company.

Location

New York City is a 50-minute train ride away from New Brunswick. Aside from Silicon Valley, the city is a growing hub of innovation in entrepreneurship. If you want to know if your idea has the legs to make it, pitch it in New York. Both WeWork and AlleyNYC host pitch events that not only hone your pitching skills, but also provide invaluable insight from industry professionals. Building an entrepreneurial skillset is also a lot easier near the city, with programs like General Assembly offering comprehensive coding workshops to build game-changing apps.

Resources

Rutgers is home to one of the largest pools of resources available to students. To launch a successful startup, you’re going to need to pull a lot of these resources from different places. For coding and development help, there’s RUMAD. For design, RAD‘s got your back. RES is a great place to meet fellow students with a passion for entrepreneurship. The MakerSpace on Livingston’s campus is an incredible resource for students who want to make 3D-printed prototypes of products. The school has invested millions to create tools for students to use. You just need to go out and find them.

But, the greatest resource to young founders is the Internet. Learn how to code on CodeAcademy. Learn about what it takes to start a company on Y Combinator’s “Startup School” YouTube series.

Rutgers is the underdog of the Big 10. We’re scrappy and we’ve always been in the shadows of the Ivies. But, with passionate innovators taking a chance and building companies that matter, Rutgers can have an impactful legacy of student entrepreneurs building things that change the world.