UC Berkeley Haas Debuts Innovation Lab

MBA students at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business can now take advantage of adaptable work spaces that better facilitate collaborative learning in the newly opened Innovation Lab.

Made possible by a gift from alumnus Michael Gallagher, former Haas Board chairman and retired CEO of Playtex Products, the 2,700-square-foot  ILab was designed to provide additional room for more team-based and experiential learning—cornerstones of the Haas School’s curriculum.

Movable tables and chairs, as well as white-board partition walls, enable students in the ILab to break into small groups without disturbing others, which is much more difficult to do in the school’s traditional tiered classrooms.

The primary users of the ILab will be students taking classes in the school’s innovative leader curriculum, who also will be able to study and collaborate in the space on a drop-in basis when classes are not in session, the school explains.

“Teaching in the new iLab shows what education can be: active; collaborative; flexible; exciting,” says Adjunct Professor Nora Silver, director of the school’s Center for Nonprofit and Public Leadership.

“As I taught Social Sector Solutions for Social Enterprises in the iLab last week, I was able to vary working with the whole class, consulting with the five teams working separately, and encouraging teams to move around and learn from one another. It was a wholly satisfying and exciting experience.”

To learn more about how UC Berkeley Haas professors are using this new, flexible learning environment, visit the Haas newsroom.