Emily Martin is invested in bridging the gap between the arts and entrepreneurship and innovation. She believes in the value of effectuation in higher education classrooms.
Discovered in the late 1990s by Saras Sarasvathy, effectuation is an entrepreneurial approach focusing on taking smart action with available resources. For those in the arts, this means taking an inventory of one’s skills, deciding on a path that involves a bit of risk, and going for it.
Rather than leaving students to wait for someone else’s validation, Emily empowers them to identify their skills inventory and build opportunities on their own terms.
What Emily is doing here at Bucknell is reaching a broader audience.
Emily recently reconnected with the Society for Arts and Entrepreneurship Education – an organization aiming to advance formal training and high educational standards for arts entrepreneurship education.
Lately, Emily has been a woman on the move, presenting twice for the College Music Society, as well as at universities around the country.
However, while on campus in February, Emily had an opportunity to connect with someone who “got the bridge we’re trying to build.” While he spent time at Bucknell for PGCEI’s Cultivating Entrepreneurial & Innovative Mindsets in Nonprofits and the Arts Symposium, Steve Bass, ’79, former president and CEO of Oregon Public Media, put his clarinet skills to use for a performance alongside Emily.
Through the performance, Emily hoped to demonstrate to students, faculty, staff, and community members that “the possibilities for what you can create and achieve are endless.”
Watch Emily Martin, soprano, Steve Bass, clarinet, and Sezi Seskir, piano, perform below.