Since joining Tsai CITY in August 2019, Zoe Hunter has led programs like our Accelerator and Innovator’s Toolkit series, mentored student innovators, and helped Tsai CITY continue to evaluate and iterate on our work — so it’s only fitting that she’s recently been promoted to Director of Student Programming. Reflecting on her time at Tsai CITY so far, Zoe says that getting comfortable with failure has been a key lesson.

As Tsai CITY’s future home takes shape on Becton Plaza, the center’s team is looking forward to this next phase — and already imagining how students might fill the space with new ideas and innovations.

The 12,500-square-foot building will include a large, flexible workspace that can be configured for a variety of events, along with smaller meeting rooms and communal areas. “The new building will be a game-changer for Yale students,” says Tsai CITY executive director Clare Leinweber. “It will contribute to a new center of gravity on campus for students exploring, building, and launching new ideas for solving real-world problems.” The building’s central location, along Yale’s rapidly growing innovation corridor between Prospect Street and Hillhouse Avenue, will further boost its accessibility. In combination with other centers and programs around campus, it will further strengthen Yale’s innovation ecosystem — fostering connections between entrepreneurs, creators, and leaders from diverse backgrounds and disciplines.

Tsai CITY’s team includes three Innovation Fellows, each of whom manages a unique portfolio of programs and projects. Curious what they’re working on and thinking about lately? Catch up on some recent stories:

“We were in the back washing blenders so they could keep taking Snackpass orders,” recalls co-founder and CEO Kevin Tan. The team from order-ahead food startup Snackpass was willing to get their hands dirty to keep up with demand at one of their first restaurant partners, Tropical Smoothie Cafe on the Yale University campus.

Tsai CITY’s Student Innovation Fund and Student Event Fund offer grants of up to $500 to help students realize ideas of all kinds. This semester’s funding recipients included event organizers, musicians, artists, researchers, club leaders, startup founders, and more from across Yale’s campus. Over the past month, we spoke with students behind four projects to learn more.

Building on a successful first year in 2018-2019, Tsai CITY again partnered with Yale’s Asian American Cultural Center this fall to offer the Arts & Media Innovation Awards.

Forbes’ 2020 30 Under 30 list includes a number of Yale entrepreneurs. This year’s honorees include founding members of the teams behind Snackpass (a 2017 Tsai CITY Accelerator team and winner of the 2018 Miller Prize), Verb Energy, and Junzi Kitchen. Explore Forbes’ full 30 under 30 list here.

Students by day and home cooks or aspiring entrepreneurs by night, the Intensive’s participants came to the program’s kickoff with their own recipes and ideas.

This fall, I started a new role, which came with one of the coolest job titles I’ve ever held: “Environmental Innovation Fellow.” When I told that to friends and family, they responded with both fascination and confusion, occasionally following up with, “What does that mean?” It’s a good question, one that I’ve often struggled to answer for myself over the last four months.