Identify early talent
For Canada’s startups and social ventures, identifying the right talent – and the right mindset—is a priority. Your future depends on it. Experience Ventures works with you to create entrepreneurial thinking placements for students.
Students receive an honorarium through Experience Ventures, while you are asked to provide in-kind support, such as your time or expertise.
Why should your venture participate?
Experience Ventures connects you with motivated student talent to help solve real business challenges—while strengthening your talent pipeline and contributing to the next generation of innovators.
Through the program, you can:
- Advance projects and solve real operational or innovation challenges
- Access fresh perspectives and diverse thinking from student teams
- Engage students with minimal impact on your time and internal resources
- Evaluate prospective talent in a real-world work environment
- Build and diversify your future talent pipeline in the innovation ecosystem
- Provide leadership opportunities for your team to develop managerial skills
What you can expect:
- Low time commitment
- No-cost access to student talent
- Structured project and challenge support
- High-quality student engagement focused on outcomes
Partner with Experience Ventures to get meaningful work done today—while building the talent and teams you’ll need tomorrow.
How does Experience Ventures work?
- Apply
- Get accepted
- Define project scope
- Onboard
- Get matched with students
- Complete placement
Explore placement opportunities
We offer five distinct types of placements, each designed to support ventures in different ways while providing students with meaningful, hands-on experience. Choose the category that best aligns with your needs and capacity.
Hackathon/ideathon
Multiple student teams work on a real challenge from your venture over a focused 16-hour sprint, developing and presenting innovative solutions for evaluation by your team and a panel of judges. This placement runs over a maximum of two weeks, with light mentorship from your team to guide students throughout the process.
Sustainability Solutions Lab
Student teams work on a sustainability-focused challenge from your venture over a five-week period, dedicating approximately 40 hours to research, analyze, and develop impactful solutions. In the final week, teams present their ideas to a panel of judges, including your team. Light mentorship from your organization is expected throughout the experience.
Project-based
A team of up to four students works on a project scoped around your venture’s needs, dedicating approximately 80 hours over six to ten weeks, depending on scope and availability. Projects can range from marketing and market research to web development and other business needs. Your team will act as the project manager, providing weekly check-ins, mentorship, and final feedback on deliverables.
Student-in-residence
A student works closely with your venture on a focused project aligned with your web design, graphic design, or social media needs. Each student dedicates approximately 80 hours over six to ten weeks, depending on scope and availability. This placement is specifically designed for clearly defined, skill-based deliverables in these areas. Your team will provide weekly check-ins, mentorship, and final feedback on the completed work.
Interdisciplinary
If your project requires a range of skills and perspectives, this placement brings together students from different programs to collaborate as a multidisciplinary team. Each student contributes up to 80 hours over six to ten weeks, depending on project scope and availability. Your team will provide weekly check-ins, mentorship, and final feedback to guide the project to completion.
Not sure which type of placement is the best fit for your needs?
Contact us at experienceventures@conestogac.on.ca or mabedini@conestogac.on.ca — we’re happy to help you find the right option for your venture.
Frequently asked questions
Complete the registration form linked above.
There are no funding or wage subsidies associated with this program, and you are not required to pay students directly. Students receive an honorarium funded through Experience Ventures for their participation. In lieu of financial compensation, ventures are expected to provide an in-kind contribution, such as staff time, mentorship, workspace, equipment, or materials.
The number of students assigned to your project varies based on the placement type and the scope of the work. Our team will work with you to determine the appropriate team size.
Participating ventures are expected to:
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Define the project scope and outline key deliverables
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Attend a kick-off session to introduce your organization and project
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Provide ongoing mentorship and guidance (typically weekly or at scheduled intervals, depending on the type of placement)
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Review final deliverables and provide feedback on student work
Overall, the program is designed to require a low but meaningful time commitment while ensuring strong outcomes.
Participant experiences
Past partners
- Cambridge Food Bank | Food security ideathon
- Sustainable Waterloo Region | Sustainability solutions lab – Food security
- Playmove Canada | Canadian market expansion project
- ContractApp | Sales lead generation project
- Kharris Technology | Software quality assurance project
- Simple Studios | Tiny dungeon game design project
- SustainablEdge Technologies | Student-in-residence
- Mycro Harvest | Student-in-residence
- MedInclude | Student-in-residence
- Foqus Technologies Inc. | Student-in-residence
Past partners
- GHD | Adaptive reuse ideathon
- ClimateActionWR | Sustainability solutions lab – Transportation
- Full Circle Foods | Zero waste hackathon
- Playmove Canada | Canadian market expansion project
- ConnectedKW | Community mapping and content development project
- Helprr | App and web feature enhancement project
- Innovate-Ops | Smart factory IoT support project
- AiimSense | Web development project
- ClariNexus | Web development project
- Lady Hill Creamery | Branding and visual content project
Participant experiences
“What an amazing opportunity for Cambridge Food Bank and our entire community! The creative ideas have given us direction, and you will soon see many ideathon submissions in our day-to-day practice!”
Host venture, winter 2025
“What each student delivered was truly impressive; they helped us navigate complex challenges and brought valuable insights to our team. This experience was exceptional, and the students’ contributions played a key role in helping us introduce our product to the Canadian market.”
Host venture, fall 2025
“We found the Experience Ventures team to be responsive, supportive, and well-organized throughout the process. Overall, the program provided real value to our venture and helped accelerate our development work. We would highly recommend Experience Ventures to other early-stage companies looking to collaborate with motivated and capable students.”
Host venture, winter 2026
Contact
Connect with Experience Ventures at Conestoga College to learn more about available placements and discuss opportunities for partnership and collaboration.
