Rit on Tv News - Student entrepreneurs

>> ANCHOR: RIT recently completed a rather unusual student survey. The school wanted to know how many students already owned their own business. Well it turns out more than 30 freshmen run their own businesses, and about 150 students overall are entrepreneurs. For a school focusing on innovation, it's a significant study. 13WHAM's Evan Dawson tells us what kinds of businesses these students are creating. >> REPORTER: RIT student Chris Tosswill took a class in entrepreneurialism and learned something surprising about building websites and Web applications. >> CHRIS TOSSWILL: I can build something for $5,000, which a similar company would charge $30,000 for. >> REPORTER: So he launched and incorporated his company, Kloud Kraft. With 10 clients, all in the Rochester area, he's learning about running a business. >> CHRIS TOSSWILL: The money pays for my rent, you know, occasional outings, some of my tuition, books, stuff like that. >> REPORTER: Dr. Richard DeMartino directs the Simone Center for Innovation and compares today's dorm room tech businesses to the paper routes of the past. >> RICHARD DeMARTINO: So the very skills they develop through Facebook and through doing websites are now means by which they can get work. >> REPORTER: Like Chris', most of the 150 businesses on campus are technology based and most are only successful enough to maybe pay for books, maybe tuition, not much more than that. But Dr. DeMartino says these students are getting the kind of experience usually reserved only for graduates. >> RICHARD DeMARTINO: They come in with this wonderful entrepreneurial attitude and some experience, and we try to take them and build them and use the leverage of RIT's mix of technology, design art and business and try create something bigger and more scalable. >> REPORTER: Chris will probably work for a larger company after he graduates, but he could use what he's learning now to be his own boss again someday. >> RICHARD DeMARTINO: It's smart to work for someone for a while until you find the opportunity and get the networks you need to grow. >> CHRIS TOSSWILL: I've learned so much from doing, the sort of classic business logic of fail early and fail often. >> REPORTER: Thanks to what he's learned at RIT, Chris hasn't failed yet. Evan Dawson, 13WHAM News.