Two faculty awards were presented during the evening. And both, in different ways, told the same story: that entrepreneurship at Lehigh isn't confined to interdisciplinary extra-curricular entrepreneurship programs. It's got curricular support too — happening in classrooms across the university. Congratulations to both Dr. Michael Lehman and Dr. Michael Rivera: two Michaels who help make the likes of what the night’s celebration is all about.
The Entrepreneurship & Innovation Faculty Achievement Award: Dr. Michael Lehman
As Director of the Technical Entrepreneurship Master's Program in the Rossin College of Engineering, Dr. Michael Lehman has built something special — a curriculum that invites students across disciplines to learn to launch, earning a professional master's degree in a single year. He developed courses within Lehigh's Research Translation AcceLUrator to open entrepreneurial pathways for doctoral students, and through a partnership with Technical University of Dortmund, his students have worked alongside peers from across the globe.
The award is chosen from nominations from students, faculty and staff, and Lehman received multiple nominations from across the university. One such nomination shared a shining example of Lehman’s approach: when a research team was preparing for the 3 Rivers Venture Fair, Lehman did more than offer encouragement. He challenged their assumptions, reshaped their narrative, connected them to the right people — and they came home with bronze. The student who nominated him wrote: "Without his mentorship, we would not have been able to present with clarity, confidence, or impact."
The John B. Ochs Teaching Award: Dr. Michael Rivera
The Ochs Award, endowed by Professor John B. Ochs upon his retirement after 40 years at Lehigh, is specifically designed to recognize educators whose fields are outside the entrepreneurship curriculum and who are taking real risks in the classroom. This year's recipient, Dr. Michael Rivera, Assistant Professor of Business Information Systems in the College of Business, won by a margin of nominations that the committee called decisive.
In his AI Strategy course, Rivera replaced traditional exams with live, iterative pitching cycles and AI-driven venture projects. Students described a classroom that "functions not like a lecture hall but like a startup." On the first day, students had to identify their skills, find collaborators, and build a team — in minutes.
Rivera has co-founded two startups, and by all accounts brings both into the room every single day. One student wrote that he "invited us to pitch our startup as a live case study and stays after to help us understand a Harvard Business article — because that's just who he is."
Meet all the Innovate! Celebrate! Winners
Innovate! Celebrate! 2026: From 'What If?' to What's Real
The annual Innovate! Celebrate! event was less a ceremony than a demonstration. On the evening of April 28, Lehigh University's Office of Entrepreneurship filled the room with confetti, applause, and something harder to manufacture: proof. Proof that curiosity, when given the right ecosystem, becomes something real.
