A Controlled Experiment Related Entrepreneurial Education to Students' Start-Up Decisions

Abstract

A CONTROLLED EXPERIMENT RELATING ENTREPRENEURIAL EDUCATION TO STUDENT'S START-UP DECISIONS INTRODUCTION Over the last two decades, institutions of higher learning have experienced an increased demand for courses dealing with entrepreneurship and new venture creation. Vesper and McMullan (1988) report that while only around a half dozen U. S. universities offered entrepreneurship courses in 1967, the number had increased to around 300 by 1988. These figures are not surprising when both the substantial effect entrepreneurship education has on entrepreneurial success (Chusimir 1988, Ronstadt 1985, Clark et al. 1984) and the positive relationship between entrepreneurship education and economic development (McMullan and Long 1990, McMullan and Long 1987, McMullan et al. 1986, McMullan et al. 1985) are considered. In their efforts to respond to the growing demand for entrepreneurship education, universities have created a variety of course offerings. These range from traditionally structured courses consisting of lectures, venture design projects, case studies, and readings (Vesper 1986) to innovative courses developed to address the unique personality characteristics of the entrepreneurship student (Sexton and Bowman-Upton 1987). However, studies related to teaching effectiveness of entrepreneurship courses have been limited (Sexton and Bowman-Upton 1988). There has been a lack of formal educational research in the field of entrepreneurship, with almost no research treating the subject of performance outcomes in entrepreneurship education (Vesper 1985). The purpose of this article is to contribute to the literature on the effectiveness of entrepreneurship education by reporting the results of a study that empirically assessed the impact of an introductory entrepreneurship course on students' views of a new venture's viability. BACKGROUND The decision of whether or not to initiate a venture is central to the understanding of entrepreneurial activity. Though different authors discuss new venture initiation from various perspectives, decision making is an important part of each author's conceptualization. For example, Greenberger and Sexton (1988) present a model that, depicts the decision to initiate a new venture as arising from the interactions of a number of factors, including personality, situational variables, self-perceptions, and social support. Olson (1986) characterizes entrepreneurs as opportunistic decision makers, and Cole (1959) identifies decision making as the critical or key component in entrepreneurship. Timmons et al. (1985) suggest that, when faced with a constant flow of opportunities, knowing which opportunity to focus on and which to say no to is critical for entrepreneurs. Despite this importance of entrepreneurial decision making, few authors have empirically investigated the entrepreneurial decision process itself, and Vesper (1980) suggests that tracking back the mental process through which venture ideas are generated and screened is a type of research that remains to be done. This research was undertaken in order to give introductory entrepreneurship students the opportunity to make multiple simulated new venture decisions at both the beginning and the end of an entrepreneurship course. The resulting data provided individual students with a basis for better understanding their own new venture decision process. Additionally, the course's ability to change student decision behavior from a primary emphasis on long-term profitability to a more balanced consideration of the means to achieve that profitability was assessed. Entrepreneurship Course Pedagogy A review of the syllabi from entrepreneurship courses (Vesper 1985) reveals numerous teaching approaches. Though diversified, each approach provides students with exposure to entrepreneurial activities while laying the groundwork for the critical skills needed to pursue entrepreneurship as a career option. …

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