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Presentation at the 31st Annual OABEC Conference, Niagara Falls, November 16-18, 2005.

The Development of Entrepreneurship Education across Universities in Canada 1999-2004: A National Study. Teresa V. Menzies Ph.D. Presentation at the 31st Annual OABEC Conference, Niagara Falls, November 16-18, 2005. Entrepreneurship Education Key Questions.

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Presentation at the 31st Annual OABEC Conference, Niagara Falls, November 16-18, 2005.

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  1. The Development of Entrepreneurship Education across Universities in Canada1999-2004: A National Study. Teresa V. Menzies Ph.D. • Presentation at the 31st Annual OABEC Conference, Niagara Falls, November 16-18, 2005.

  2. Entrepreneurship Education Key Questions • What constitutes the field of entrepreneurship, according to the “for credit” university course offerings at universities across Canada? 2. What changes are evident in the evolution of the field of entrepreneurship when we make a comparison with university course offerings in 1999 and currently in 2004, utilizing a national census based on universities across Canada?

  3. Rationale for Focus • Tidal wave of popularity and incidence of entrepreneurship courses. • There is a lot of discussion about Research but little about Teaching domain. • Necessary to ascertain how the field of entrepreneurship is developing. • Take a national perspective.

  4. What and Why? • What courses are being offered? • Which faculties are offering the courses? • What changes have taken place in the entrepreneurship course offerings since 1999?

  5. Rationale for Teaching Entrepreneurship • Raise awareness of entrepreneurship as an alternative career choice. • Provide students with the skills and knowledge for venturing, intrapreneurial, social entrepreneurship or enterprising activities. • Potential of entrepreneurship education to nurture personal, regional, and national economic growth.

  6. Pragmatism and Venturing Rates • Evidence of a higher venturing rate amongst graduates of entrepreneurship courses. • Entrepreneurship majors shown to have a higher propensity to venture than business majors from other functional areas (27% vs. 9%), (Swinburne 87%). • 48% of Engineering graduates who had taken one course in entrepreneurship during their undergraduate engineering degree, had owned a business at some time since graduation, compared with 26% for a comparison group who had not taken an entrepreneurship course (Menzies & Paradi, 2002).

  7. Pragmatism and Venturing Rates …Continued. • Menzies and Paradi (2003) also found that for the non venturing students, those who had taken a single course in entrepreneurship were significantly more likely to reach a top management position in an organization. • Peterman and Kennedy (2003) utilizing a pre and post test methodology, found that the intentions of students towards a venturing career were enhanced by entrepreneurship education.

  8. The Entrepreneurship Domain • Ucbasaran, Westhead and Wright (2001) argue six broad themes, as follows: • (1) Theoretical antecedents (e.g. entrepreneur personality, traits, behavioral aspects, cognitive processes); • (2) Type of Entrepreneur (e.g. nascent, novice, serial, portfolio); • (3) Process (e.g. opportunity recognition, information search, resource acquisition and business strategies); • (4) Type of Organization (e.g. start-ups, corporate venturing, MBOs, franchising, inheritance); • (5) External Environment (e.g. environmental conditions and new venture creation, population ecology, resource dependency); • (6) Outcomes (e.g. firm level survival, financial performance).

  9. Methodology: Menzies Study 2004 • Census of all the university entrepreneurship courses and programs across Canada. • Triangulation methodology (e.g. web, e-mail membership lists, report). • Courses categorized according to Menzies and Gasse (1999) earlier study of Entrepreneurship courses in Canada, which allows comparison. Careful attention was paid to include only courses that were clearly dedicated to entrepreneurship, small business or family business related. • Additional categories to those found in 1999 were added as appropriate to a total of 18 categories. • Course frequencies were tabulated by faculty, and university.

  10. Results • 243 undergraduate, 108 graduate entrepreneurship courses being offered at universities across Canada. • A 9% increase for undergrad and 5% for graduate course numbers, over 5 years. • Geographic dispersion of undergraduate courses at each university, was averaged by region. See map next.

  11. Potential and Actual Offering of Entrepreneurship Courses by Faculty

  12. Courses with Increasing Incidencebetween 1999 and 2004. In 1999 17 courses offered, in 2004 44 = 159% increase 14 to 14 21 to 25 19% 10 to 19 90% 9 to 13 44%

  13. New Courses since 1999 16 5 8 7 6

  14. Courses: Decreased # since 1999 49 to 16 (67%) 14 – 7 (50%) 7 - 6 (14%) 18 - 11 (39%) 5 – 3 (40%) 4 – 1 (75%)

  15. Faculties of Business Dominate • The teaching of entrepreneurship is mainly the domain of the Faculty of Business. Engineering next in terms of ent. course offerings. • It may be the case that students from across the university can take the Business Faculty entrepreneurship courses. • Then again, if the courses are being provided mostly for business students this would seem to be sub optimal given that business students seem much less likely to venture than, for example, science students (35% vs47%).

  16. # of Undergraduate Courses (rank ordered, top to bottom) Acadia Bishop’s Carleton Dalhousie Laurentian Mt. Allison Ottawa SFXU Waterloo UBC Concordia Moncton MSVU UQAR Queen’s Regina Trent Windsor York Nipissing UNBC UPEI UQAM Royal Roads Saint-Anne Saskatchewan SFU Athabasca Brandon Guelph Lakehead Lethbridge McMaster Winnipeg Calgary MUN UQEO St. Mary’s Toronto WLU Alberta Manitoba UQAC Laval Ryerson Brock UQTR Victoria UWO HEC McGill Sherbrooke UNB UQAT

  17. Lost Opportunity • Evidence of lost opportunities for students and potential for economic development. • Of note - only 12% of Faculties at Canadian universities offer entrepreneurship courses. • Further indication of Lost Opportunity is the gender imbalance in students taking entrepreneurship.

  18. SELF EMPLOYMENT • Men comprised 66% of self employed individuals in 2004 (Statistics Canada Labour Force Survey). • US and Australia have comparable percentages with about a third of their self-employed being women. • In many countries women are less often self-employed, for example, in Ireland, Turkey, and Greece (Bird & Brush, 2002). • The five-year growth rates in self-employment between 1999 and 2004 shows an increase of 0.3% for men and decrease of -0.5% for women (Statistics Canada, 2004). [ [1]

  19. SME Ownership As of 2000 in Canada: • Only 15% of SMEs were led by a female entrepreneur. • Men were the lead entrepreneurs in 67% of SMEs. (Joint ownership for remaining 18%) • Majority female-owned SMEs were smaller scale, with fewer employees, less often incorporated, had slower growth and were less inclined to exporting than SMEs owned by male owners (Ind Cda. 2002).

  20. Human Capital Link • Considerable disparity between women and men according to incidence of lead entrepreneur, business ownership, and self-employment. • Human Capital Link: Do male and female university students have a similar predilection to study entrepreneurship?

  21. Education and Outcomes • Research has shown a link between taking entrepreneurship courses and a subsequent higher propensity to venture. • Research into entrepreneurship education has mostly monitored and analyzed theproliferation of entrepreneurship courses at universities in the US and other countries but has not specifically examined the ratio of male to female students in entrepreneurship classes.

  22. Little Research on Female Entrepreneurs Entrepreneurship has been a “man’s domain”, “tycoon histories focus exclusively on stories of ‘successful businessmen’ (Livesay, 1982), and practitioner literature frequently refers to ‘exploitation’ of opportunities by successful men such as Bill Gates, Donald Trump, and Henry Ford.” (p. 42). (Bird and Brush, 2002, p.41)

  23. Women and Entrepreneurship • Carter and Brush (2004) question whether women and men attempt to start their own business in the same proportion. • They suggest that perhaps women become discouraged during the business start-up stage and exit more frequently than men.

  24. Different Venturing Rates Influencing factors according to Carter and Brush (2004): • Human and financial capital, • Intentions influenced by“self efficacy, attributions, work values, decision making, and motivation theories (including independency, need for control, and risk-taking propensity” (p. 16) • Risk propensity, • Family business background, • Access to opportunity, and • Social networks.

  25. Enrollment at Business Schools • As of 2002, Canadian business schools, at the undergraduate level, had approximately equal numbers of male and female students enrolled (49.5% male, 50.5% female)(AACSB/CFBSD, 2004). Data based on a survey with 22 business schools responding. • In the same survey, at the graduate level, 62.4% of MBA students and 62.8% of Ph.D. students studying business were male. The Ph.D. response rate for the survey was 10 faculties out of a potential 19.

  26. Research Questions 1. Is the incidence of female undergraduate and graduate students in university entrepreneurship courses lower than that of male students? 2. Do female compared to male undergraduate students, studying business, choose as frequently to take a degree concentration in entrepreneurship? 3. What are the reasons for choosing a concentration in entrepreneurship and do the reasons differ according to gender? 4. What are the reasons for notchoosing a concentration in entrepreneurship and do the reasons differ according to gender?

  27. Methodology • Enrollment in Entrepreneurship Courses by gender - Macro Picture: Based on national study of entrepreneurship education (Menzies, 2004). Study A. 2.Concentration in entrepreneurship, reasons for choosing or not choosing a concentration in entrepreneurship, and according to gender: Based on a study in 2005 at Brock University. Study B.

  28. Study A – Cross Canada • Information was provided by instructors for 243 undergraduate and 128 graduate courses. • Enrollment according to males and females in courses was provided for 86 undergraduate and 35 graduate courses. Response rate of 35% undergraduate and 27% for graduate courses. • Caution: Some respondents may have estimated.

  29. Enrolment by Faculty • Considerable disparity between male and female student course enrollments according to faculty/program area within the university. • Average differential of 16% for male vs. female student enrolment for courses in Faculties of Business. • Women outnumbered men by an average of 26% in only one entrepreneurship course offered in a recreation program. • Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics and Agriculture faculty/programs, men greatly outnumbered women in the entrepreneurship course enrolments. This adds to the argument that women don’t have the “right kind of education for hi-tech ventures”.

  30. Enrolment in Undergraduate Entrepreneurship Courses

  31. By Geographic Region • In Quebec and the Atlantic Provinces (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, PEI, and Newfoundland and Labrador) comparable number of females and male students enrolled. • In the same provinces, at the graduate level, male students greatly outnumber female students. • Largest differential by sex, for both undergraduate and graduate students, is found in Ontario where on average 30% more males are enrolled in undergraduate entrepreneurship classes and this figure is 48% at the graduate level. • Also considerable difference in the number of women and men enrolled in courses in the Western Provinces (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia).

  32. Enrolment in Entrepreneurship Courses

  33. Elective vs. Required • Required Courses at Undergraduate level - majority of males in courses in the West and Ontario, majority of females in required courses in Quebec and the Atlantic Provinces, reflecting FOB enrolments. • Elective courses at Undergraduate level - Ontario shows the largest differential with an average 32% more male students enrolled in entrepreneurship classes, closely followed by Quebec with a 26% disparity. • Graduate level, male students predominate in entrepreneurship classes. In Ontario there were on average 40% more males than females in elective entrepreneurship courses, and this figure was 38% for Quebec, 34% for the Atlantic Provinces, and 30% for the West.

  34. Enrolment:Required vs. Elective Ent. Courses

  35. Enrolment: Required vs. Elective Ent. Courses

  36. Specific Course Type • Almost all undergraduate classes have a higher percentage of male students, ranging from an average of 10% to 58%. • Almost all graduate level courses had higher percentages of males enrolled, ranging from 28% to 60%.

  37. Study B: Business Concentrations • Undergraduates choose from 5 or 6 (e.g. accounting, finance, human resources, marketing, operations, or entrepreneurship). RATIONALE • Personal interest and expectation of wealth. • Perception of Difficulty, e.g. accounting and finance. • Least importance: family, friends, or advisors, or the reputation of the concentration. • Little research in this area of business concentration choice and differences for male vs.female students.

  38. Methodology • Responses were confidential and anonymity was guaranteed • Administered during regular, required classes in the Faculty of Business at times that were convenient to 11 different professors • Survey included 11 closed questions with the option to expand on answers • Questions covered topics such as • Preference for particular concentrations • Reasons for choosing a concentration • Reasons for not choosing Entrepreneurship

  39. Respondents • 475 respondents indicated sex: • 55% male, 45% female • 18 to 27 years of age • Equally distributed across year of study • 33% had officially declared a concentration • Remaining 42% undecided; 58% did not meet req’s • 1 female and 10 males had declared Entr. • 3 females and 9 males intended to choose Entr.

  40. Response Mean Rank Male (n=10) Female (n=1) To learn skills to run a business 2.2 1 Interested in this type of work 2.2 2 Interest spurred by introductory course 4.1 n/a Good job opportunities 4.3 3 Influence from parents, friends, or advisors 4.6 7 High salaries available after graduation 5.0 5 Reputation of the concentration at Brock 6.7 8 Quality of instruction 6.8 n/a Those who did choose Entr. • All intended to own their own business – frequently the primary reason Note: Students ranked their choices with 1 being the most important factor. “Other” items included: “proven work experience in the field, doing well in courses in that concentration, the diversity offered by the concentration”.

  41. Those who did not choose Entr. • Significantly higher likelihood of females to respond: “Entrepreneurship does not ‘fit’ my personality”. • Females also ranked “Entrepreneurship doesn’t interest me” quite highly. • No significant difference between males and females with regard to other reasons for not taking a concentration in Entrepreneurship.

  42. Mean Rank Male (n=188) Female (n=170) High Risk Career 3.13 2.95 Doesn’t interest me 3.55 2.99 Few job opportunities 3.60 3.85 No intro course before choosing 3.72 3.75 Doesn’t 'fit' my personality 3.80 2.84*** Influence from parents, friends, or advisors 4.93 5.13 Those who did not choose Entr. Note: ***p = <.001. Students ranked their choices with 1 being the most important factor. “Other” items included: “do not need a degree in entrepreneurship to start a business, dislike the professor of the introductory course, entrepreneurship is too ambiguous, it cannot be ‘taught’, more interested in another concentration”.

  43. Summary and Conclusion Research Questions: • Is the incidence of female undergraduate and graduate students in university entrepreneurship courses lower than that of male students? Yes • Do female compared to male undergraduate students studying business choose as frequently to take a degree concentration in entrepreneurship? No • Is there a difference between men and women according to the reasons they give for taking a concentration in entrepreneurship? Inconclusive • Is there a difference between men and women according to the reasons they give for not taking a concentration in entrepreneurship? Yes

  44. Summary and Conclusion cont’d • Women alluding to the “entrepreneurial personality”. • Possibility of generally held myths influencing female respondents • Do women think they are the wrong sex for this type of career? • Are we lacking in outstanding female entrepreneurs as role models?

  45. Further research is ongoing. • Previous and current research on Entrepreneurship and the Canadian Universities is funded by The John Dobson Foundation • Any Questions?

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