Tapping into SMU’s innovation ecosystem
Tapping business plan tips, a network of mentors and serious seed funding, startup-minded students aiming to transform their bold ideas into businesses get the edge they need to succeed.

More Great Stories with World Changing Impact

Narrative as Reality
Acclaimed education advocate and NFL athlete Kelvin Beachum ’10, ’12 utilizes art as another way to bring people together to explore and understand our complex world.

Detecting the Unseen
A team of SMU researchers use satellite radar imagery to reveal hundreds of unseen landslides occurring in Western U.S. states.

Excelling in Business
Be self-aware. Embrace unexpected opportunities. Lead with empathy. That’s just some of the great advice shared by alumni who took their SMU degrees and forged unexpected paths after leaving the Hilltop. One thing they all have in common is that they didn’t let fear get in their way. When they have a vision, Mustangs are unstoppable.

Finding Her Yes
Hannah Clark ’23 never dreamed NASA would be in her future. Now she’s completing her second stint with the space agency where she’s working on an engineering challenge for other students.

Finding Math Everywhere
SMU’s Candace Walkington helps math come alive by connecting it to everyday experiences.

Neighborhoods in Focus
Researchers combined street-level investigations with SMU’s supercomputer power to reveal infrastructure deserts. Their study lays the groundwork for improving neighborhoods.

3 Mustangs, 2 Years, 1 Global Pandemic
SMU undergraduate students Kelsey Hodge ’20, Nushah Rahman ’23 and Alexandra Savu ’23 walk us through their first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic in a short film by Alexa May ’23. They navigate a campus-wide shutdown, dramatic shifts in religious and social life, cries for racial justice and an uncertain future. Despite the challenges, their stories offer a collective voice of hope as we look forward to a new year on campus.

Big idea. Big rewards. Big future.
Startup co-founder Seun Suberu ’23 arrived on campus with big ambitions for the future of his CollegePlus app. Fast forward three years, and Suberu has honed new business skills while earning more than $85,000 in funding through multiple SMU competitions designed to jump-start student-led innovation.

Entrepreneurial brothers go “all in”

Continuing the legacy of empowerment

Lab on a chip

Welcome back Mustangs

Stoking the fires of change

Here We Go, Mustangs! 2021

Art as Activism

Common Connections
For their first two years at SMU, our students live on campus in 11 Residential Commons where they often learn as much about themselves as they do about one another.

A Witness to History
NBC News and MSNBC correspondent Garrett Haake ’07 lives by the advice he learned from an SMU faculty mentor – stay packed, and don’t make any dinner plans that can’t be canceled.

Prepared to Lead
Ana Rodriguez and the SMU Cox Latino Leadership Initiative are breaking down barriers and reversing the trend for Latino leaders – one promotion at a time.

Welcome Mustangs
There’s no doubt that the pandemic has changed how we live, learn, work and teach. We’ve been working hard across campus to welcome our new and continuing Mustangs this fall!

Finding Your Place
Kaitlyn Contreras, '20 was the first in her family to go to college. Find out how she found her place at SMU.

Tom & Chance Buning ‘20
Father-and-son graduates Tom Buning ’20 and Chance Buning ’20 have great memories from their shared time as students at SMU.

Here We Go, Mustangs!
They’ve put in the hard work, and now the Class of 2019 is ready for life’s next big adventure.

Mickey's Wild Ride
From bobsledding to the Oklahoma State Legislature, Mickey Dollens ’11 never quits.

Teaching Innovation
SMU professors bring innovative tools and techniques to wherever the students are. And it only starts in the classroom.

Conquering the Divide
SMU researchers hope their work will help cities make more equitable choices for residents of neighborhoods like Dallas' Vickery Meadow.

Cooking Up Something Good
SMU first-year student Sarah Tersigni spoons a tiny piece of eggshell from the four eggs she's cracked into a glass bowl. She's making the filling for the lemon squares that she will serve later to fellow students in her residence hall.

Here We Go Mustangs '20
The COVID-19 pandemic changed everything this semester, but couldn’t stop our 2020 grads. They pivoted to remote classes and continued to learn, create and achieve.

“SMU allowed me to try so many new things and supported my intellectual curiosity. Looking back, it is really cool to see all that I have accomplished.”
- Monica Lee '20