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Governor Mike DeWine and JobsOhio announced in January of 2021 that Cleveland State University will be the lead public higher education partner in an initiative dubbed the Cleveland Innovation District (CID). The CID is a five-member consortium focused on making Northeast Ohio more attractive to business and more competitive regionally, nationally and globally in the burgeoning healthcare and IT sectors. The projected economic impact to Cleveland and Ohio is expected to be around $3 billion. The other members of the consortium are The Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals, The MetroHealth System, and Case Western Reserve University. 

With $20 million from the economic development organization JobsOhio, CSU will educate and graduate 10,000 new students over the next 10 years in the STEM fields of technology, life sciences and data science. Three CSU Colleges will play key roles in growing this talent pipeline: the Washkewicz College of Engineering, the Monte Ahuja College of Business, and the College of Arts and Sciences. 

Across the three colleges, 15 programs are targeted for growth. Five programs within the College of Engineering are targeted for growth, including Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Software Engineering, and Data Science.

CSU is committed to increasing not only the number of undergraduate and graduate degrees, but also the number of certificates, adult learning opportunities, online courses, internships and cooperative education opportunities. 

As Executive Director of CSU’s involvement in the Cleveland Innovation District, Professor of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering Dr. Joanne Belovich leads a governing body that includes Deans or Associate Deans from the three CSU colleges, along with Deans from the Online College and Graduate College, the Vice President for Enrollment Services, and others.    

According to Dr. Belovich, demographics are among the biggest challenges CSU faces in fulfilling its pledge to the Cleveland Innovation District. “Northeast Ohio,” she says, “is not growing in population. If anything, the areas we traditionally draw from have declining numbers of graduating high school students. We're doing our best to counteract that trend in these high demand fields.” 

Since Belovich was named Executive Director of CSU’s CID effort in June of 2021, her team has notched some impressive results. In the 15 programs targeted for growth, the original goal was a rather aggressive 10% increase in fall student enrollment relative to 2019. “We have surpassed that,” Belovich says, “with a 47% increase in the targeted programs.” Belovich cites additional gains in the number of certificates and total STEM degrees—which are 13% and 11% of the way toward the 10-year goal, respectively. 

The CSU CID team is working with the Admissions and Marketing Offices to grow enrollments, looking beyond Northeast Ohio to recruit from bordering states and foreign nations. A renewed focus on online programs is helping to capture even more non-traditional students. 

Attracting existing businesses to Northeast Ohio and fostering business startups will also spur growth—and part of that, says Belovich, is “providing the talented workforce. That’s where CSU comes in.”