About

The Snider Enterprise and Leadership Fellows (SELF) Experience is a pre-college entrepreneurship and leadership program at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business, now in its thirteenth year. It is run through the Ed Snider Center for Enterprise and Markets — named after Ed Snider, the late entrepreneur and founder of the Philadelphia Flyers — and reflects the center's core conviction that enterprise and self-leadership are learnable skills with broad application across careers. The program earns transferable college credit through UMD's Terp Young Scholars platform, which administers enrollment and houses the "Enterprising Leader" course that constitutes SELF's academic backbone.

The curriculum is organized around three interlocking themes: self-knowledge, entrepreneurial thinking, and team-based problem solving. Students work with Smith School faculty — including faculty from UMD's prestigious QUEST Honors interdisciplinary program — through lectures, workshops, and team exercises culminating in a capstone pitch of an original product or business concept to a panel of judges. The design thinking framework runs throughout, and the program explicitly frames entrepreneurship as a mindset rather than a track — applicable in medicine, law, and public service as much as in business. For 2026, the residential option has returned after a post-pandemic hiatus, with limited on-campus housing available through a separate Snider Center application process. Online and commuter sections run concurrently.

SELF is genuinely modest in scale — roughly 43–68 students per year — which creates an intimate cohort environment unusual for a university pre-college program. Alumni frequently cite the residential experience and peer community as the program's most lasting value, and a meaningful number go on to enroll at UMD Smith as undergraduates. For students considering Smith or UMD as an undergraduate destination, SELF functions as a clear demonstrated interest signal — program directors and faculty are actively involved, and the pipeline from SELF to UMD is documented and visible.