Entrepreneurship education used to be a few courses taught in a
few business schools. Then it became a lot of courses in a lot of
business schools. Now it's becoming much more, including
full-fledged doctoral degree programs, university departments,
endowed professorships, and even a change in the way entire
universities approach educating their students.
"The great new turf in the next three to four years is the
massive support for 'entrepreneurship across the
curriculum' efforts," says David Newton, founder and CEO
of TechKnowledge Point Corp., the Santa Barbara, California-based
venture research firm that compiled the data for
Entrepreneur's 2nd Annual Top 100 Entrepreneurial
Colleges and Universities.
Newton, who is also professor of entrepreneurial finance at
Westmont College in Santa Barbara, and other entrepreneurship
educators say the cross-curriculum movement promises to
institutionalize entrepreneurial thinking in higher education
outside of the business school, making it part of far more
students' educations.
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"It's having biology, sociology, pre-med, engineering
and sports medicine students take one or two entrepreneurship
courses during their studies," says Newton. The reason
educators are embracing entrepreneurship is that entrepreneurial
thinking is becoming recognized as fundamental to developing skills
in analysis, communication, critical thinking, innovation and other
competencies of higher education. "A high-quality liberal arts
education is now viewed as a perfect complement to an
entrepreneurship education and perspective, and vice
versa."
Other educators see similar expansion of entrepreneurship
education. "It's going beyond the traditional boundaries
of business schools in terms of where it's located," says
William B. Gartner, professor of entrepreneurship at the University
of Southern California. Indeed, entrepreneurship programs have
sprung up at universities that don't even have business
schools, appearing as part of sociology, engineering or other
curricula.
While entrepreneurship is spreading across more curricula and
institutions, it is also being refined, according to the results of
our 2004 study. This year's ranking looked at an increasing
number of characteristics to improve precision. Among the changes
Newton describes are more carefully defining incubators and
technology transfer initiatives, and allowing subcategories within
program offerings where there's more than one focus.
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For a complete listing of the collegiate entrepreneurial
rankings, visit
www.entrepreneur.com/
topcolleges. For detailed listings, sorts and comparisons, plus
complete analysis of more than 60 criteria for 500-plus
entrepreneurship programs nationwide, go to
www.entrepoint.com.
More data and greater precision are good ideas from the
prospective student's point of view, says Scott Shane,
professor of economics and entrepreneurship at Case Western
Reserve University in Cleveland. "There's getting to
be a much greater divergence among the providers of
entrepreneurship education," says Shane. "It matters more
where you're getting your education. It used to be that
everybody offered the same thing. Now people are focusing on
different topics, using different tools, and applying different
techniques in the classroom. It's more important to be an
educated consumer."
Changes between the first rankings in 2003 and this year's
are many but are mostly modest. Five programs, including Babson
College; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; The University of
Arizona; University of California, Berkeley; and University of
Maryland, College Park, repeated as members of the top tier of
national Comprehensive programs. Harvard University and the
University of Pennsylvania (Wharton), however, both dropped out of
the top tier.
Ball State University; California State University, Fresno; St.
Louis University; University of Oregon; and University of Portland
appeared for a second year in the top tier of the regional
Comprehensive program rankings. Elsewhere, new faces showed up,
including Temple University among national reputation institutions
and Auburn University in the regional group.
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