Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) ventures are some of the most successful small businesses in America, and this trend is even greater among veteran-owned businesses.
Despite this trend, there are significant barriers for veterans applying their STEM skills to start an enterprise or find a job. The Institute for Veterans and Military Families (IVMF) at Syracuse University is working hard to change all that.
“Syracuse University’s Institute for Veterans and Military Families was created to leverage what higher education does extremely well – teach, train and inform,” said Mike Haynie, Syracuse University vice chancellor and IVMF founder and executive director. “We’re here to prepare military-connected families for jobs, careers and business ownership.”
To date, IVMF says more than 100,000 have leveraged these programs, all provided at no cost to participants.
Veteran Entrepreneurs Are Leading STEM Startups
Street Smarts VR is a tech company that participated in one of the many no-cost IVMF entrepreneurship programs designed to arm veteran-owned businesses with access to the training, networking and financial relationships they need to succeed, no matter where they are in their business lifecycle.
Founder and Marine Corps veteran Oliver Noteware applied his experience in virtual reality and military training and created Street Smarts VR.
“I learned the importance of consistent, realistic training in the Marine Corps and want to bring high-quality training to all first responders,” Noteware said. “The military gave me the training and management skills I needed to start my own company, and the business training from the IVMF helped me to plan out my plan trajectory, form key relationships to assist me and helped me to get to the next level with capital.”
Access to Capital Difficult for Veteran Entrepreneurs
Despite this trend for veteran companies, they face a number of obstacles to start a STEM-focused business. Lack of access to capital tops the list, as more than 80,000 veterans closed their business as a result of inadequate cash flow, sales or personal loans/credits.
“You just don’t know sources of capital available to veteran businesses, and you need money to make money,” said Warren Foster, owner of Science Playhouse. His company is a hands-on science and technology lab, providing STEM education and enrichment programs for kids of all ages. “There’s no shortage of marketing to me as a veteran entrepreneur, but those aren’t my best options.”
Foster is an alumnus of the IVMF Entrepreneur Bootcamp for Veterans program, an intensive training held at 10 universities around the country providing experiential learning for veteran business owners in business finance, marketing and strategic planning.
Another example is scDataCom, which provides high-tech security and communications solutions. “We started with a great understanding of the tech and our customer,” said Kathleen Ford, scDataCom founder and military veteran. “Now our biggest challenge is to find tech talent to keep up with demand, and we are looking to hire veterans.” Ford is also an EBV graduate whose business revenue has grown by 400% in the last three years.
Employer Demand for STEM Talent
According to the nonprofit Code.org, the United States will add about one million STEM jobs by 2020. There were 607,708 open computing jobs in the country last year, but only 42,969 students with STEM expertise entered into the workforce. To meet this demand, many employers are looking to military veteran talent.
Veterans are nearly 1.5 times more likely to be in STEM jobs than non-veterans. They come to jobs “STEM pre-qualified” through their military training. There’s even a positive trend of female veterans into STEM from 2010 to 2014. Compared to female non-veterans, female veterans are nearly twice as likely to be in STEM occupations.
A traditional military market like San Diego, for example, has 100 cybersecurity firms looking to fill estimated 4,200 unfilled jobs. But military veterans face significant barriers to STEM jobs like this.
The greatest barrier is the lack of a pipeline matching veterans’ skill sets to degrees and jobs. Military.com’s Military Skills Translator + Personality Assessment tool can be a good starting point to identify key skills that can help veterans zero in on the right career path.
The IVMF's Onward To Opportunity-Veteran Career Transition Program is combatting this by creating STEM training and certification while service members are still in uniform.
“We are certifying service members in everything from SAS to Cisco,” said Jim McDonough, managing director of the O2O-VCTP program. “By doing this, we can create a bridge to a STEM career and even get them placed with an employer before they leave the military.”
The Institute for Veterans and Military Families (IVMF) delivers leading programs in career, vocational and entrepreneurship education and training while also conducting actionable research, policy analysis and program evaluations. For more information, visit ivmf.syracuse.edu.
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