Hacking 4 Oceans
Entrepreneurship + Ocean/Coastal Conservation Course
In Spring 2020, UC Santa Cruz offered the first class of its kind focused on identifying solutions to key coastal and ocean problems using Lean Design
In 2024, enrollment is open to students across the UC system and Monterey Institute of International Studies
Please note we will not be offering Hacking4Oceans in Spring 2025
Please complete the interest form if you would like to be considered for future course offerings.
Learn Lean Launchpad and other Lean Design techniques for startup success and solve real problems.
Tackle complex problems critical to saving our oceans and coasts with an interdisciplinary team of students from across campus.
Open to graduate and/or undergraduate students from any school, department, or program at UCSC or MIIS or through the APRU program.
Limited enrollment by permission of instructor team.
Interested in the course? Want to learn more?
Email Hacking4Oceans@ucsc.edu
For more details, watch the short intro to the course below or review the slides
How do I enroll in the course?
UCSC graduate and undergraduate students: Permission numbers will be issued based on the interest form. Register for CSP 281A (Hacking for Oceans—Lean Design Methods)
Non-UCSC undergraduates: After completing the interest form, click ENROLL on the UC Online Website HERE
Non-UCSC graduate students: Click HERE to complete the Intercampus Exchange form. In addition to your signature, you will need to obtain the signature of your home department Graduate Advisor or Chair and the signature of your Graduate Division dean. Once your form has been signed by those individuals, please email the form to csp@ucsc.edu for routing at UCSC.
Please note, for UCSC students, this course cannot be taken for ENVS 196 Senior Seminar
Questions?: Email csp@ucsc.edu
Sign up for Office Hours with this LINK
Across the country, startups are using the principles of Lean design to create the next generation of solutions. Startups operate with continual speed and urgency 24/7. Over the last few years they've learned how to be not only fast, but extremely efficient with resources and time using lean startup methodologies. The Lean Startup methods have been adopted to take on actual problems that are curated and presented either to students taking a class or made broadly available in open challenges to the community.
In this course, you will use Lean Startup methods and approaches to solve actual problems facing ocean focused organizations (government, for-profit, and non-profit).
Hacking 4 Oceans takes on problems facing the ocean. Some problems might use Lean to solve internal process problems (e.g. cut the time it takes to process permit approaches to advance adaptation) to large scale problems that have applicability in other regions (e.g. novel solutions to create sustainable aquaculture feed). Students will form teams and choose one problem to work on for the quarter from a set of available problems. Each team works on a different problem.
Read stories about the course here.
General
Course Title: Hacking 4 Oceans: Solving Ocean Issues with Lean Launchpad
Course #s: CSP 281A, 5 units
Syllabus:
Enrollees must complete the interest form.
Term: 2024 Course offered Spring Quarter on Monday and Wednesday from 3:30-5pm over Zoom; First class is Monday, April 1 and Final class is Wednesday, June 6.
Teaching & Planning Team: Anne R. Kapuscinski, Radhika Malpani, Andrea Carafa, and Sarah Eminhizer (additional advising from Steve Weinstein and Sue Carter)
Email questions to the Teaching Team: Hacking4Oceans@ucsc.edu