Jenny Owens, Sc.D., MS

Assistant Dean, Graduate School
Faculty Executive Director, the Grid 

jowens@umaryland.edu 
Dr. Jenny Owens is the Assistant Dean in the Graduate School and Faculty Executive Director of the Graduate Research Innovation District, “the Grid.” Jenny is a passionate social entrepreneur with a decade of experience in higher education, seven of those years at UMB in a graduate health science and human services environment. Jenny’s research interests include social innovation, academic entrepreneurship, and patient-centered healthcare design. Dr. Owens has a doctorate in Information and Interaction Design which emphasizes human-centered design and design thinking. Her master’s program focused heavily on business systems, marketing, finance, and organizational behavior. These graduate degrees, along with her undergraduate foundation in principles of health, anatomy, and physiology, give her a unique background in health science, business, and design-thinking. 

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J. Howard Kucher, DPA

Dr. J. Howard "Jim" Kucher serves as the Program Director of the MS in Health and Social Innovation, he cultivates strong entrepreneurial skill development for students, researchers, and professionals through experiential learning courses and workshops. Dr. Kucher is an internationally recognized thought leader in social entrepreneurship. Prior to joining UMB, Kucher was an Assistant Professor in the Brown School of Business and Leadership at Stevenson University, where he taught courses in social and commercial entrepreneurship, marketing, management, sales, project management and product development.

Previously, Dr. Kucher was the Founding Executive Director of Entrepreneurship Programs at the University of Baltimore, where he led the Baltimore Social Enterprise Collaborative. In addition to his teaching duties, Kucher works as a consultant to leading and emerging social benefit initiatives to help them improve outcomes and increase sustainable revenues. He has successfully secured over $70m in working capital on behalf of mission-oriented enterprises and assisted over 100 area nonprofits and social enterprises in developing new models for meeting the needs of their constituents while increasing the sustainability of their organizations.

Kucher earned a Doctorate in Public Administration with a concentration in Social Entrepreneurship, as well as a MBA with an Entrepreneurship specialization from The University of Baltimore. He holds a B.A. from Kean University and has also earned certification as a project management professional and a new product development professional. He has been recognized as a Baltimore Renaissance Seed Scholar, an Unsung Hero of Small Business and a Fulbright Specialist Scholar in Social Entrepreneurship.

Taylor DeBoer, MA

Assistant Director
taylor.deboer@umaryland.edu