PORTLAND, Ore. — A team of Oregon State University students won a statewide social business contest Monday, and will get help to start their own business.
The OSU team proposed to start a sports league for children with disabilities in Benton County called STAR Sports. They wanted to start this business because they say children with disabilities don’t have a lot of opportunities to be in sports leagues. As first-place winners of the Oregon Social Business Challenge, they will receive business support from the Portland State University Social Business Incubator to help start their company, as well as share $5,000 in scholarships.
The goal of the challenge was to create products and services that address unmet economic, environmental and social needs in communities throughout Oregon.
A team from the University of Oregon won second place for their proposal for the Oregon Community Health Van, a mobile healthcare clinic that would provide medical services to rural areas in Oregon. It also received scholarship funds.
Seventeen Oregon college teams presented their proposals to a group of state business, education and nonprofit leaders.
