Teaching Entrepreneurial Thinking
“Most entrepreneurs travel down the startup path without a roadmap and believe no model or template could apply to their new venture. They are wrong. For the path of a startup is well worn and well understood . . . [T]here is a true and repeatable path to success, a path that eliminates or mitigates the most egregious risks and allows the company to grow into a large, successful enterprise.”
(Morris/USASBE Annals 2016)
This program creates conditions for learning though self-discovery, self-acceptance and self-expression, where learning is a search for lifelong meaning and entrepreneurship is part of a student’s way-finding.
Entrepreneurial thinking is a “mindset” that allows one to see and pursue opportunity, create value, and communicate a compelling vision. Entrepreneurs believe in a future that can be shaped by human action. Entrepreneurial thinking involves creative thinking, resource leveraging, tenacity/perseverance and guerilla skills.
Teaching entrepreneurship should provide opportunities for students to experience the joy of creating, to flex their entrepreneurial muscle and to exceed their own expectations rather than strive to meet the expectations of others.The role of the educator is to challenge, provoke, disrupt, reinvent and be out in front of the issues, problems, and concerns.
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To learn more about the class learning goals, structure, and outcomes, listen to our presentation at the International Conference on Education and E-Learning (ICEEL) 2017.
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Fregetto and Warn (2017): Offering an Online Course to Rural Women in Thailand using Facebook.
Entrepreneurial Competencies
We view entrepreneurship as a process that unfolds as individuals interact with their environments. Through experiential learning exercises students create the foundation for entrepreneurial thinking. In the program, students construct experiences, gain feedback, confirm or refute their assumptions and understandings, and mold their attitudes and behaviors into competencies. The goal of our program is to transform students into successful entrepreneurs via the development of key entrepreneurial competencies.
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Following are the entrepreneurial competencies that are the focus of our program.