Students from the Blackstone LaunchPad, Wayne State University's student entrepreneur program, and other colleges around the Metro Detroit area will showcase their business models at Wayne State's Get Launched! event, 9 a.m.-2 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011, in the Student Center Ballroom, 5221 Gullen Mall, Detroit.

Also at the Get Launched! event, Hatch Detroit will reveal the winner of their contest for the next great Detroit-based retail business idea. The prize is $50,000 cash and a suite of donated professional services. The Hatch Detroit contest is open to the public and the deadline for submission is Thursday, Sept. 1; visit http://www.hatchdetroit.com/ for more details.

Wayne State understands that entrepreneurs are very much a part of Detroit's revitalization. Get Launched! allows today's students to showcase tomorrow's next great business model. Their business ideas range from mobile apps and social media technology to retail and automotive engineering, and everything in between.

During the event, the students with the most innovative business models will have the opportunity to pitch them before a panel of Detroit business leaders, "Shark Tank" style. The panel will include Rishi Jaitly of the Knight Foundation, Hatch Detroit founders Ted Balowski and Nick Gorga, Slow's Bar-B-Q owner Phil Cooley, and Dan Izzo of BizdomU.

There also will be opportunities during Get Launched! to win cash and prizes. The event is free and open to the public. For more information, call Aubrey Agee, senior program administrator for Blackstone LaunchPad, at 313-577-1533.

Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution offering more than 400 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 32,000 students.