The Evolution and Implications of Entrepreneurship Curriculum at Universities

Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development, Dec 2005

The notion of entrepreneurship is not a new one. Neither is the idea of entrepreneurship education. However, post-secondary entrepreneurship curriculum has exploded the past thirty five years. A number of reasons have helped to fuel this growth. An argument can be made that entrepreneurs can be made and are not born. Entrepreneurship education is the tool that encourages the transformation process. At the university level, most entrepreneurship curriculum is taught in business schools and colleges. Implications indicate that entrepreneurship education is good not only for students who become entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship curriculum stimulates creativity and ownership, two traits desired by corporate America.

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The Evolution and Implications of Entrepreneurship Curriculum at Universities

Running Head: ENTPRENEURSHIP CURRICULUM AT UNIVERSITIES 1 The Evolution and Implications of Entrepreneurship Curriculum at Universities Kyle L. Harfst Southern Illinois University Carbondale OLJ25mar05003 Author: Southern Illinois University Carbondale 0 0 Kyle L. Harfst Department of Workforce Education and Development Southern Illinois University Carbondale Carbondale , IL 62901-4605 618-453-3427 , USA OLJ25mar05003 Author: The Evolution and Implications of Entrepreneurship Curriculum at Universities ABSTRACT The notion of entrepreneurship is not a new one. Neither is the idea of entrepreneurship education. However, post-secondary entrepreneurship curriculum has exploded the past thirty five years. A number of reasons have helped to fuel this growth. An argument can be made that entrepreneurs can be made and are not born. Entrepreneurship education is the tool that encourages the transformation process. At the university level, most entrepreneurship curriculum is taught in business schools and colleges. Implications indicate that entrepreneurship education is good not only for students who become entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship curriculum stimulates creativity and ownership, two traits desired by corporate America. INTRODUCTION The process of entrepreneurship is powerful. As stated by Kuratko & Hodgetts Entrepreneurship is a dynamic process of vision change and creation. It requires an application of energy and passion towards the creation and implementation of new ideas and creative solutions. Essential ingredients include the willingness to take calculated risks – in terms of time, equity, or career; the ability to formulate an effective venture team; the creative skill to marshal needed resources; and fundamental skill of building solid business plan; and finally, the vision to recognize opportunity where others see chaos, contradiction, and confusion. (p. 30) One school of thought indicates that universities shape people’s minds and influence people’s decisions toward career paths. A diverse, yet not contradictory school of thought indicates that university curricula are a reflection of society’s wishes. No matter who is correct, the growth of entrepreneurship curriculum in universities the past thirty five years is exponential. This growth is not limited to the United States. Most industrialized countries have entrepreneurship curriculum in its business school forefront. In understanding this unprecedented growth, one must look at the history of entrepreneurship, the creation of entrepreneurship curriculum and its defining role within the university structure. METHOD A comprehensive secondary analysis was performed to support underlying assumptions developed by the author while teaching non-credit entrepreneurship seminars at a medium sized university in the Midwestern United States. Sources were gathered from peer-reviewed journals, professional conference proceedings, published governmental research, entrepreneurship-based foundations, and books. Implications and recommendations proposed by the author were based on secondary research and the author’s experiences as an entrepreneurship instructor. THE HISTORY OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP One could argue that entrepreneurs have been around since the beginning of time. Maranville (1992) implied that the historical perspective of entrepreneurship has included the hunter/gather age, the agricultural age, the mercantile age, the industrial age, and the service age. Cunningham & Lischeron (1991) indicated that the current word “entrepreneurship” comes from the French verb “entrependre” and the German word “unternehmen,” both which mean to “undertake” (as cited in Carton , Hofer & Meeks, 1998, ¶ 9). Scholars Bygrave and Hofer in 1991 defined the entrepreneurial process as involving all the functions, activities and actions associated with the perceiving of opportunities and the creation of organizations to pursue them (as cited in Carton , Hofer & Meeks,1998). The modern concept of entrepreneurship was introduced by Schumpeter (1934, p. 74) who defined entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship as follows: “the carrying out of new combinations we call enterprise; the individuals whose function it is to carry them out we call entrepreneurs.” The explanation of entrepreneurship is best viewed on continuum. A sociological view of entrepreneurship lies on one end of the spectrum while the opposing end indicates that entrepreneurship is no more than business development. Carton, Hofer & Meeks (1998,p. 5) stated that “the essence of entrepreneurship is the pursuit of discontinuous opportunity involving the creation of an organization with the expectation of value creation to the participants”. Gartner (1988) was slightly more elementary with his definition. He indicated that entrepreneurship is the creation of organizations. Maranville (1992) indicated that the power of business ownership is also called entrepreneurship. He further stated that this interpretati (...truncated)


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Kyle L. Harfst. The Evolution and Implications of Entrepreneurship Curriculum at Universities, Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development, 2005, Volume 1, Issue 3,