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Journal of Education for Business
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Interdisciplinary Dimensions in Entrepreneurship
Nancy M. Levenburg , Paul M. Lane & Thomas V. Schwarz
To cite this article: Nancy M. Levenburg , Paul M. Lane & Thomas V. Schwarz (2006)
Interdisciplinary Dimensions in Entrepreneurship, Journal of Education for Business, 81:5,
275-281, DOI: 10.3200/JOEB.81.5.275-281
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.3200/JOEB.81.5.275-281
Published online: 07 Aug 2010.
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Interdisciplinary Dimensions in
Entrepreneurship
NANCY M. LEVENBURG
PAUL M. LANE
THOMAS V. SCHWARZ
GRAND VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY
GRAND RAPIDS, MICHIGAN
ABSTRACT. Entrepreneurship programs and courses are offered by many
business schools to support students who
aspire to start, own, and operate businesses.
Although these offerings are directed primarily toward business majors, based on
data the authors collected from over 700
students, many nonbusiness majors also
possess entrepreneurial characteristics and
perceive the need for entrepreneurship curricula. The findings suggest that although
business majors regard their traditional education as adequate preparation to start a
new business, the greatest need for entrepreneurship courses and curricula exists
within academic disciplines outside of the
business school.
Copyright © 2006 Heldref Publications
L
ike baseball and apple pie, owning
a small business is part of the
American Dream. Interest in creating
and owning a small business has never
been greater than it is today. New business formation in the United States has
broken successive records for the last
few years, growing at a rate of between
2% and 9% and totaling over half a million dollars annually (U.S. Small Business Administration, 2002).
Students also are increasingly choosing to start their own businesses both
before and during college, as well as
post graduation. Some researchers have
suggested that the appeal of selfemployment and launching a new business has resulted from continued uncertainty about the economy, corporate and
government downsizing, and a declining number of corporate recruiters on
college campuses (Moore, 2002). Moreover, members of Generation X do not
perceive launching a business as a risky
career path. Described as “the most
entrepreneurial generation in history”
(Zimmerer & Scarborough, 2002, p.
15), they account for approximately
70% of new business start-ups (Bagby,
1998; Phillips, 1999).
To fuel students’ entrepreneurial
ambitions, majors and minors in entrepreneurship have emerged on numerous
college and university campuses, signaling that specialized majors in traditional business disciplines (e.g., marketing,
management, accounting, and finance)
may inadequately serve entrepreneurial
students. Traditional specialized majors
within business schools are frequently
designed from the perspective that graduating students will seek employment in
specialized departments within large
established firms. However, students
who are interested in creating new businesses (i.e., entrepreneurship) need to
develop an array of skills that will support their new ventures (e.g., planning,
risk taking, market analysis, problem
solving, and creativity; McMullan &
Long, 1987). This is because successfully launching a new venture requires
the mastery and blending of skills that
are different from those required to
maintain—or even grow—an established business.
While new venture opportunities exist
within nearly all academic disciplines
(e.g., graphic arts, nursing, computer science), the majority of entrepreneurship
initiatives at U.S. colleges and universities are offered by business schools (Ede,
Panigrahi, & Calcich, 1998; Hisrich,
1988) and for business students (e.g.,
Roebuck & Brawley, 1996). In fact, most
studies that have been conducted to
explore entrepreneurial intent among
college students have focused on business students (e.g., DeMartino & Barbato, 2002; Ede et al.; Hills & Barnaby,
1977; Hills & Welsch, 1986; Krueger,
Reilly, & Carsrud, 2000; Lissy, 2000;
May/June 2006
275
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Sagie & Elizur, 1999; Sexton & Bowman, 1983). However, Hynes (1996)
advocated that entrepreneurship education can and should be promoted and fostered among nonbusiness students as
well as business students. Consequently,
if a goal in designing entrepreneurial
programs is to assist students within and
outside the business school, it is important to understand the similarities and
differences between business school students and their nonbusiness counterparts.
We examined the entrepreneurial
characteristics among interdisciplinary
students and the relationships between
academic major and interest in entrepreneurship. The focus was on two groups
of students: (a) business majors who
wanted to start a new business (business
entrepreneurs [BE]) and (b) nonbusiness
majors who want to start a business
(nonbusiness entrepreneurs [NBE]). In
this study, we made no effort to distinguish between majors within the school
of business. In addition, we examined
differences between both business and
nonbusiness majors who did not want to
start a new business (business nonentrepreneurs [BNE] and nonbusiness nonentrepreneurs [NBNE], respectively). No
other study has undertaken such a comprehensive investigation of entrepreneurial interest among an interdisciplinary student population. These findings
should hold interest for business schools
that may seek to better understand,
serve, and support the entrepreneurial
ambitions among students of diverse
academic backgrounds.
Review of the Literature
Entrepreneurship as an Academic
Discipline
According to Alvarez (1993), interest
in entrepreneurship among business disciplines began in the 1940s, with entrepreneurship journals emerging in the
1960s. Amid debates about the legitimacy of entrepreneurship as a business discipline, entrepreneurship courses were
introduced into the realm of business
education curricula during the 1980s
and subsequently experienced an eightfold increase in student enrollments
over the next decade.
On a national level, interest in entrepreneurship is substantial, as evidenced
276
Journal of Education for Business
by the number of educational institutions that (a) have established centers
for entrepreneurship, (b) have established separate entrepreneurship academic departments, (c) currently offer
entrepreneurship majors, minors, concentrations, or special certificate programs, and (d) teach entrepreneurship
or similar courses. We found 131 U.S.
colleges and universities that support
entrepreneurship education in at least
one of the first three aforementioned
formats and, among those institutions,
92 of them (70.2%) offer a major in
entrepreneurship with another 8 (6.1%)
offering a minor. Seventy-seven institutions offer graduate-level programs in
entrepreneurship (58.8%). Finally, the
number of schools offering an entrepreneurship course has grown from a handful 20 years ago to more than 1,000 at
present (Hisrich, 1988; Kuratko & Hodgetts, 2004; Solomon & Fernald, 1991).
Further recognition of entrepreneurship as an academic discipline is evidenced by the growing number of professional journals and conferences
devoted to the interface between traditional disciplines and entrepreneurship.
Additionally, publications such as U.S.
News and World Report and Success
Magazine have begun to rank the top
university entrepreneurship programs as
a separate discipline alongside the traditional functional areas of accounting,
finance, management, and marketing.
Student Interest in Entrepreneurship
Early research focused on exploring
business students’ interest in entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship courses,
and identifying characteristics of entrepreneurs and variables that influence
entrepreneurial intent (e.g., Ede et al.,
1998; Hatten & Ruhland, 1995; Hills &
Barnaby, 1977; Hills & Welsch, 1986;
Hutt & Van Hook, 1986; Sexton & Bowman, 1983). As an example, Hills and
Welsch found high interest among business students in entrepreneurship (52%)
and entrepreneurship coursework (80%).
More recently, Henderson and Robertson (1999) collected data from young
adults aged 19–25 years who were studying entrepreneurship in Scotland, business students in England, and newly
hired employees at a major U.K. bank.
Not surprisingly, 67% of those studying
entrepreneurship expressed a desire for
self-employment, compared with 5%
among the rest.
In 1999, Sagie and Elizur reported the
findings from a study conducted among
students of small business and students
of business and economics. The purpose
of their study was to measure the
achievement motive among students
regarded as having high- and low-entrepreneurial orientations, respectively.
Sagie and Elizur found differences
among four achievement components
tested with small-business students tending to score higher than their business
and economics counterparts. Similarly,
Krueger and colleagues’ (2000) study to
compare two intentions-based models of
entrepreneurship activity focused on
data collected from undergraduate business students. DeMartino and Barbato
(2002) analyzed gender differences in
motivational factors among intending
entrepreneurs by studying career perceptions among Master of Business Administration (MBA) alumni of a U.S. toptier business school.
To summarize, a review of the literature suggests that there has been growing interest in entrepreneurship among
business students and the faculty members who teach them. To date, the
majority of published studies have
focused on the identifying characteristics (e.g., desire for self-employment),
related explanatory factors (e.g., prior
family business experience), and demographic differences (e.g., gender, race)
of students interested in entrepreneurship. Given the proliferation of entrepreneurship courses and curricula
offered by business schools in recent
years, the lack of research into the
entrepreneurial interest and intentions
among an interdisciplinary student population is surprising. In this study, we
attempted to understand interest in
entrepreneurship among nonbusiness
students and to explore similarities and
differences between them and their
business school counterparts.
Research Focus
A committee of business and engineering faculty members at Grand Valley State University, including the coauthors of this article, was charged with
exploring the potential for a program in
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entrepreneurship in the summer of
2003. The committee was quickly confronted with the issue of identifying a
target market. At first, it seemed obvious that it should be business and engineering students. However, as discussion unfolded, considerable anecdotal
information emerged about interdisciplinary students’ interest in starting their
own businesses. This led the committee
to conclude that, prior to establishing a
target market, it was essential to conduct research to determine levels of
interest among the university’s interdisciplinary population. Following the goal
of assessing the level of interest in new
ventures and new venture courses across
all university areas, the committee identified four important research questions:
1. To what extent do students across
the university population possess the
characteristics that are commonly
viewed as indicators of entrepreneurial
intent?
2. To what extent do students have an
interest in innovating new products or
services?
3. What is the level and extent of
interest in taking new venture courses
(i.e., entrepreneurship)?
4. Are there differences between BE
and NBE in regard to their entrepreneurial intent and interest in entrepreneurship curricula (Questions 2 and 3
above)?
METHOD
We conducted our study among all
students enrolled in courses during the
summer of 2003 at Grand Valley State
University. The faculty committee
developed and refined a questionnaire
and pretested it with a convenience sample of 50 students in the university’s student union. After refining and improving the questionnaire, we posted it on
Blackboard (a course management software; Blackboard, Inc., Washington,
DC) and announced it to the population
of students enrolled in summer classes
(approximately 5,000) via an e-mail
message. It should be noted that the university is rated among “America’s 100
Most Wired Universities” according to
Yahoo! Internet Life and is well known
for its use of innovative technology,
including in-class computer stations,
wireless connectivity in academic buildings, and Web-based instructional activities. Thus, each student has e-mail
access as well as a Blackboard account.
The mass e-mail directed students to a
site on Blackboard where they could
complete the 27-item questionnaire
electronically. We offered an incentive
for completing the survey; respondents
were entered into a drawing for one of
six $25 gift certificates redeemable at
the university bookstore.
The questionnaire contained 17 statements designed to measure interest in
entrepreneurship and characteristics of
entrepreneurs to which students responded to statements such as “I am a risk
taker” using a 5-point Likert scale (1 =
strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree).
The questionnaire also included specific
demographic descriptors, such as academic major and minor, academic rank,
and gender.
RESULTS
In total, 728 of the approximately
5,000 students enrolled in summer
courses responded to the e-mail and
completed surveys during a 1-week period in June 2003, representing a response
rate of nearly 15%. With respect to academic major and gender, we judged that
the sample was representative of the university’s student population during the
regular academic year.
Evidence of Interest in
Entrepreneurship
Using a 5-point Likert scale, respondents indicated their level of agreement
with two statements regarding a career
in entrepreneurship: (a) “I would like to
work for myself” and (b) “I would like
to start my own venture.” With respect
to the desire for self-employment,
38.7% (281 of 727) chose strongly
agree and 34.9% (254 of 727) chose
somewhat agree. Twenty-three percent
(167 of 727) of respondents indicated
they strongly agreed with the second
statement and 36.2% (263 of 727) said
they somewhat agreed with the statement. By combining the strongly agree
and somewhat agree responses, we
determined that a total of 73.6% (535 of
727) of students indicated that they
wanted to be self-employed and 59.1%
(430 of 727) expressed a desire to start
their own venture.
These statistics are higher than those
reported among U.S. students in nearly
all prior studies (e.g., Karr, 1988; Scott
& Twomey, 1988), as well as statistics
reported by DeMartino and Barbato
(2002) on the likelihood of MBA alumni of a top-tier business school becoming entrepreneurs in the short term.
Moreover, they provide a clear indication of overall interest in entrepreneurship across the university’s student population, both inside and outside of the
business school.
Academic Major
This finding led to analysis of the
academic disciplines among those students who were interested in starting a
business. Table 1 shows the percentage
of students, according to university academic discipline, who responded somewhat agree and strongly agree regarding
their level of interest in starting a business. We conducted an analysis of variance (ANOVA) that revealed no statistically significant differences between
academic major and interest in starting a
business. By inspection, however, the
highest levels of interest in starting a
business occurred outside the School of
Business, namely in the School of Nursing; the School of Social Sciences; the
School of Science and Mathematics,
which includes biology, biomedical and
health sciences, chemistry, computer
science and information systems, the
School of Engineering, geology, the
School of Health Professions, hospitality and tourism management, mathematics, movement science, physics, and statistics; the School of Education; and the
School of Arts and Humanities. Perhaps
this serves as an indication that those
who major in traditional business disciplines (e.g., marketing, management,
accounting, finance) tend to seek
employment within specialized departments in larger, more established firms,
as opposed to newer, smaller ones.
Chi-square testing failed to reveal a
difference between business and nonbusiness majors with respect to the
statement “I would like to start my own
venture” (see Table 2). We found that
both the number and the percentage of
NBE were higher than that of BE.
May/June 2006
277
TABLE 1. Student Interest in Starting a Business by Academic Major
Academic discipline
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School of nursing
Social sciences
Science and math
School of education
Arts and humanities
School of business
School of engineering
School of social work
Not specified b
Other disciplines
%a
Students (n)
65.5
64.3
60.9
60.7
56.7
53.5
45.9
33.3
—
69.3
81
98
184
56
104
143
24
3
22
13
Perceptions of New Venture
Opportunities
Note. N = 728.
a
Percentages shown are for the sum of somewhat agree and strongly agree responses. b22 students
did not identify a major.
TABLE 2. Student Interest in Starting a Business, Business Versus
Nonbusiness Majors
Student major
Businessa
Nonbusinessb
Total
Strongly
disagree
%
n
11.3
9.6
9.9
16
54
70
Somewhat
disagree
%
n
14.1
12.6
12.9
20
71
91
Neutral
%
n
21.1
17.1
17.9
30
96
126
Somewhat
agree
%
n
35.2
36.6
36.3
50
206
256
Strongly
agree
%
n
18.3
24.2
23.0
26
136
162
Note. N = 705. χ 2(4, N = 705) = 3.311 for a test of the null hypothesis that there was no difference
between a student’s major (business versus nonbusiness) and level of interest in starting a business.
a
n = 142. bn = 563.
In addition, we found that nearly 6%
of students currently owned a business.
It is interesting that the highest incidence
of business ownership was found within
the School of Social Sciences, wherein
7.1% of students sampled (7 of 98) indicated that they currently owned businesses, suggesting that entrepreneurship
holds appeal for certain segments of the
university’s student population.
Characteristics of Entrepreneurs
The survey contained six statements
describing characteristics of entrepreneurs to which students responded
using a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). The six
statements included the following: (a) I
am a risk taker; (b) I have an idea for a
new product or service; (c) I like to tinker with ideas for new products; (d) I
like to dream about new services; (e) I
278
Journal of Education for Business
found a higher percentage of agreement
among nonbusiness majors than among
business majors. Further ANOVA testing
failed to reveal any significant differences across academic disciplines.
have many ideas for possible new businesses or organizations; and (f) I am on
the alert for new venture ideas (see
Table 3).
First, we conducted an ANOVA to
determine if there was a significant difference between BE and NBE. We found
significant differences at .001 or higher
on all six characteristics, suggesting that
there were substantial differences in personal characteristics between students
who were intending entrepreneurs and
those who were not.
Next, we tested differences among
business and nonbusiness students with
regard to their level of agreement with
each of the six statements. We found statistically significant differences with
only two items: “I like to tinker with
ideas for new products,” F(703) = 4.035,
p = .045, and “I am on the alert for new
venture ideas,” F(703) = 5.309, p = .022.
With regard to the former statement, we
The questionnaire contained three
statements designed to measure students’ perceptions concerning new venture opportunities and the extent to
which they believed they should be
exposed to and encouraged to pursue
new venture opportunities: (a) There are
many opportunities for new businesses
in my major field(s) of study; (b) Students in my discipline should be
exposed to new venture opportunities;
and (c) University students are encouraged to pursue new ventures. Students
used a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly
disagree, 5 = strongly agree) to respond
to the statements. The survey results
revealed no statistically significant differences between business and nonbusiness students, F(703) = .235, p = .874,
on any of the three statements. Indeed,
students seemed to perceive opportunities for entrepreneurship across academic disciplines (e.g., “There are many
opportunities for new businesses in my
major field(s) of study,” F(8) = .432, p =
.902. Although the highest mean on this
particular item occurred among students
enrolled in the School of Social Work
(M = 3.33, SD = .58), because of the low
sample size (n = 3), these results should
be discounted. The next highest means
occurred among students enrolled in the
School of Nursing (M = 3.28, SD =
1.29), School of Social Sciences (M =
3.24, SD = 1.15) and the School of Business (M = 3.11, SD = 1.26). Once again,
these results suggest that students do not
perceive new venture opportunities to lie
exclusively within the business school;
instead, they are perceived to exist
throughout university disciplines.
Interest in Entrepreneurship
Courses
The questionnaire contained six
statements designed to measure students’ needs and perceptions concerning
support for entrepreneurship within the
university environment to which stu-
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dents responded using a 5-point Likert
scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). Overall, we found a moderate
positive correlation (r = .623, p = .000)
between students’ interest in starting a
new business and interest in taking
entrepreneurship courses.
Although there was not a statistically
significant difference at the .05 alpha
level between business and nonbusiness
majors on the item “I would like to take
(or would like to have taken) courses
about how to start a new venture,” the
calculated statistic, F(703) = 3.745, p =
.053, would seem to indicate marginal
significance. Moreover, the distribution
of means (shown in Table 4) suggests
that the strongest perceptions of the need
for entrepreneurship courses exist within
academic disciplines outside of the business school and engineering, the two
disciplines that most frequently offer
entrepreneurship courses and curricula.
Business and engineering students seem
to regard their traditional education as
adequate preparation for starting a new
business, should they choose to do so.
Interest in an Entrepreneurship
Program
We filtered the data to focus on those
students who were classified as “intending entrepreneurs” (i.e., those who indicated strongly agree or somewhat agree
with respect to level of interest in starting a new venture). Students were asked,
“If a new venture program is offered to
provide the basic skills and applied
work, I would be most interested in
_____.” Response options included (a) a
major (30 credit hours); (b) a minor (21
credit hours); (c) 1–3 courses; and (d) no
interest in a new venture course.
The distribution of responses is shown
in Table 5. From this, we concluded that
the majority of entrepreneurial-oriented
students at this particular university
wanted to take courses in entrepreneurship, although their preference was for
fewer courses and a minor over a major.
Through cross-tabulation and chi-square
testing, we failed to find evidence of an
association between major (i.e., business
or nonbusiness) and type of entrepreneurship program desired. Moreover, the
data suggest that students view an entrepreneurship curriculum as supporting
their already-selected majors in other
TABLE 3. Students’ Entrepreneurial Characteristics by Entrepreneurial
Intent
Entrepreneurial characteristic
Intending
(BE and NBE)
M
%
Nonintending
(BNE and
NBNE)
M
%
3.78
75.4
3.10
44.8
69.76
3.46
55.6
2.16
12.1
166.69
3.75
3.98
66.7
77.2
2.37
2.57
18.8
26.0
206.08
234.38
3.67
61.6
1.87
7.3
419.57
3.51
51.6
2.03
10.9
240.83
I am a risk taker.
I have an idea for a new product
or service.
I like to tinker with ideas for new
products.
I like to dream about new services.
I have many ideas for new
businesses or organizations.
I am on the alert for new venture
ideas.
F(593)
Note. N = 595. BE = business major entrepreneurs; NBE = nonbusiness major entrepreneurs; BNE
= business major nonentrepreneurs; NBNE = nonbusiness major nonentrepreneurs; Entrepreneurial Intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree (or somewhat disagree and
strongly disagree) responses to the question, “I would like to start my own venture.” Students who
were neutral about starting a business were excluded from this analysis.
TABLE 4. Mean Students’ Interest in Entrepreneurship Courses by
Entrepreneurial Intent
Academic discipline
Social sciences
Science and math
Arts and humanities
School of nursing
School of education
School of business
School of engineering
School of social worka
Other disciplines
Overall
Intending
M
n
4.16
3.94
4.08
4.00
4.00
3.83
3.55
4.00
4.33
3.99
63
112
59
53
34
76
11
—
9
417
Nonintending
M
n
2.65
2.40
2.38
1.88
2.38
2.33
2.57
1.00
3.00
2.39
20
43
21
16
13
36
7
—
4
160
F(8)
47.470*
72.084*
53.515*
60.215*
44.037*
44.598*
3.177**
—
6.769***
314.049*
Note. N = 577. Entrepreneurial intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree
(or somewhat disagree and strongly disagree) responses to the question, “I would like to start my
own venture.” Students who were neutral about starting a business were excluded from this analysis.
a
Because n = 3, there were too few cases to conduct this analysis.
*p = .000 **p = .094. ***p = .025.
disciplines, rather than a stand-alone or
second major, as was also suggested by
the preference for courses at the 100 and
200 levels.
DISCUSSION
The findings illustrate that a considerable percentage of students aspire toward
entrepreneurship, regardless of their academic discipline. From the data we gath-
ered, it appears as though the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well across the
university population (e.g., nursing,
social sciences, arts and humanities).
Indeed, these findings imply that entrepreneurial aspirations, as well as the perceived need for entrepreneurship training
or education, may be most fervent outside of the business school.
Consequently, this study suggests
that business schools look beyond their
May/June 2006
279
TABLE 5. Interest in Entrepreneurship Program Among Those Desiring
to Start a Business
BE
NBE
Entrepreneurship program type
n
%
n
%
Major (30 credit hours)
Minor (21 credit hours)
1–3 courses
No interest
Total
4
18
43
11
76
5.3
23.7
56.6
14.5
100.0
22
90
204
25
341
6.5
26.4
59.8
7.3
100.0
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Note. N = 417. BE = business major entrepreneurs; NBE = nonbusiness major entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneurial intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree responses to
the question, “I would like to start my own venture.” Students who were neutral about starting a
business were excluded from this analysis.
own internal constituents (i.e., majors)
if they, and their institutions, seek to
serve an interdisciplinary student population. This may entail reexamining
their definition of market scope to evaluate the roles that they might play in
supporting diverse academic majors.
Following this, it will be important to
develop a curriculum and courses that
are flexible enough to foster the dreams
of students whose hearts and academic
majors lie outside the business school.
This would undoubtedly require substantial discussion about admissions
standards and course prerequisites,
among other things. In this endeavor,
Diamond (1998) provided a useful
guide for course and curriculum design
and assessment.
Limitations
Although the distribution of academic
majors and gender of respondents in this
study was judged to be representative of
this university’s population of students,
incoming freshmen were underrepresented because of the timing of the study
(before new students had arrived on
campus). However, there is no reason to
believe that their opinions would have
been substantially different from other
freshmen and sophomores because we
failed to find evidence of significant difference by academic rank along items of
interest. Nevertheless, to ensure proper
representation of the student population
during the regular academic year, it
would be prudent to readminister the
study during the fall or spring semester.
280
Journal of Education for Business
Implications for Future Research
As noted, very little research exists
that explores entrepreneurialism among
nonbusiness students, yet interest in
entrepreneurship among these students is
substantial, as is the desire for a limited
number of courses to enable them to start
and operate new ventures. In designing
these courses, it seems imperative that an
array of basic entrepreneurship competencies is clearly articulated and woven
into learning outcomes and assessment
techniques, including (a) identification of
the “must-know” topics for aspiring nonbusiness entrepreneurs, both general
(e.g., communication, math, critical
thinking) and discipline specific (e.g.,
market analysis, promotion planning);
(b) the ways to most effectively support
interdisciplinary student learning (i.e.,
pedagogy); and (c) faculty deployment in
designing and teaching entrepreneurship
courses to nonbusiness students. Should
teaching entrepreneurship be the exclusive domain of business school faculty,
or should interdisciplinary faculty teams
be created to lead curriculum initiatives?
Finally, because this study was limited to students enrolled in a U.S. midwestern regional university, further
research that compares entrepreneurialism and interest in entrepreneurship at
other types of institutions, or in other
countries, would be fruitful.
NOTE
The authors thank Jaideep Motwani, Professor
and Chair of Management, and Harinder Singh,
Professor and Chair of Economics, at Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, MI.
Correspondence concerning this article should
be addressed to Nancy M. Levenburg, Department
of Management, Seidman College of Business,
Grand Valley State University, 441-C DeVos Center, 401 W. Fulton Street, Grand Rapids, MI 49504.
E-mail: levenbun@gvsu.edu
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281
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Interdisciplinary Dimensions in Entrepreneurship
Nancy M. Levenburg , Paul M. Lane & Thomas V. Schwarz
To cite this article: Nancy M. Levenburg , Paul M. Lane & Thomas V. Schwarz (2006)
Interdisciplinary Dimensions in Entrepreneurship, Journal of Education for Business, 81:5,
275-281, DOI: 10.3200/JOEB.81.5.275-281
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Interdisciplinary Dimensions in
Entrepreneurship
NANCY M. LEVENBURG
PAUL M. LANE
THOMAS V. SCHWARZ
GRAND VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY
GRAND RAPIDS, MICHIGAN
ABSTRACT. Entrepreneurship programs and courses are offered by many
business schools to support students who
aspire to start, own, and operate businesses.
Although these offerings are directed primarily toward business majors, based on
data the authors collected from over 700
students, many nonbusiness majors also
possess entrepreneurial characteristics and
perceive the need for entrepreneurship curricula. The findings suggest that although
business majors regard their traditional education as adequate preparation to start a
new business, the greatest need for entrepreneurship courses and curricula exists
within academic disciplines outside of the
business school.
Copyright © 2006 Heldref Publications
L
ike baseball and apple pie, owning
a small business is part of the
American Dream. Interest in creating
and owning a small business has never
been greater than it is today. New business formation in the United States has
broken successive records for the last
few years, growing at a rate of between
2% and 9% and totaling over half a million dollars annually (U.S. Small Business Administration, 2002).
Students also are increasingly choosing to start their own businesses both
before and during college, as well as
post graduation. Some researchers have
suggested that the appeal of selfemployment and launching a new business has resulted from continued uncertainty about the economy, corporate and
government downsizing, and a declining number of corporate recruiters on
college campuses (Moore, 2002). Moreover, members of Generation X do not
perceive launching a business as a risky
career path. Described as “the most
entrepreneurial generation in history”
(Zimmerer & Scarborough, 2002, p.
15), they account for approximately
70% of new business start-ups (Bagby,
1998; Phillips, 1999).
To fuel students’ entrepreneurial
ambitions, majors and minors in entrepreneurship have emerged on numerous
college and university campuses, signaling that specialized majors in traditional business disciplines (e.g., marketing,
management, accounting, and finance)
may inadequately serve entrepreneurial
students. Traditional specialized majors
within business schools are frequently
designed from the perspective that graduating students will seek employment in
specialized departments within large
established firms. However, students
who are interested in creating new businesses (i.e., entrepreneurship) need to
develop an array of skills that will support their new ventures (e.g., planning,
risk taking, market analysis, problem
solving, and creativity; McMullan &
Long, 1987). This is because successfully launching a new venture requires
the mastery and blending of skills that
are different from those required to
maintain—or even grow—an established business.
While new venture opportunities exist
within nearly all academic disciplines
(e.g., graphic arts, nursing, computer science), the majority of entrepreneurship
initiatives at U.S. colleges and universities are offered by business schools (Ede,
Panigrahi, & Calcich, 1998; Hisrich,
1988) and for business students (e.g.,
Roebuck & Brawley, 1996). In fact, most
studies that have been conducted to
explore entrepreneurial intent among
college students have focused on business students (e.g., DeMartino & Barbato, 2002; Ede et al.; Hills & Barnaby,
1977; Hills & Welsch, 1986; Krueger,
Reilly, & Carsrud, 2000; Lissy, 2000;
May/June 2006
275
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Sagie & Elizur, 1999; Sexton & Bowman, 1983). However, Hynes (1996)
advocated that entrepreneurship education can and should be promoted and fostered among nonbusiness students as
well as business students. Consequently,
if a goal in designing entrepreneurial
programs is to assist students within and
outside the business school, it is important to understand the similarities and
differences between business school students and their nonbusiness counterparts.
We examined the entrepreneurial
characteristics among interdisciplinary
students and the relationships between
academic major and interest in entrepreneurship. The focus was on two groups
of students: (a) business majors who
wanted to start a new business (business
entrepreneurs [BE]) and (b) nonbusiness
majors who want to start a business
(nonbusiness entrepreneurs [NBE]). In
this study, we made no effort to distinguish between majors within the school
of business. In addition, we examined
differences between both business and
nonbusiness majors who did not want to
start a new business (business nonentrepreneurs [BNE] and nonbusiness nonentrepreneurs [NBNE], respectively). No
other study has undertaken such a comprehensive investigation of entrepreneurial interest among an interdisciplinary student population. These findings
should hold interest for business schools
that may seek to better understand,
serve, and support the entrepreneurial
ambitions among students of diverse
academic backgrounds.
Review of the Literature
Entrepreneurship as an Academic
Discipline
According to Alvarez (1993), interest
in entrepreneurship among business disciplines began in the 1940s, with entrepreneurship journals emerging in the
1960s. Amid debates about the legitimacy of entrepreneurship as a business discipline, entrepreneurship courses were
introduced into the realm of business
education curricula during the 1980s
and subsequently experienced an eightfold increase in student enrollments
over the next decade.
On a national level, interest in entrepreneurship is substantial, as evidenced
276
Journal of Education for Business
by the number of educational institutions that (a) have established centers
for entrepreneurship, (b) have established separate entrepreneurship academic departments, (c) currently offer
entrepreneurship majors, minors, concentrations, or special certificate programs, and (d) teach entrepreneurship
or similar courses. We found 131 U.S.
colleges and universities that support
entrepreneurship education in at least
one of the first three aforementioned
formats and, among those institutions,
92 of them (70.2%) offer a major in
entrepreneurship with another 8 (6.1%)
offering a minor. Seventy-seven institutions offer graduate-level programs in
entrepreneurship (58.8%). Finally, the
number of schools offering an entrepreneurship course has grown from a handful 20 years ago to more than 1,000 at
present (Hisrich, 1988; Kuratko & Hodgetts, 2004; Solomon & Fernald, 1991).
Further recognition of entrepreneurship as an academic discipline is evidenced by the growing number of professional journals and conferences
devoted to the interface between traditional disciplines and entrepreneurship.
Additionally, publications such as U.S.
News and World Report and Success
Magazine have begun to rank the top
university entrepreneurship programs as
a separate discipline alongside the traditional functional areas of accounting,
finance, management, and marketing.
Student Interest in Entrepreneurship
Early research focused on exploring
business students’ interest in entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship courses,
and identifying characteristics of entrepreneurs and variables that influence
entrepreneurial intent (e.g., Ede et al.,
1998; Hatten & Ruhland, 1995; Hills &
Barnaby, 1977; Hills & Welsch, 1986;
Hutt & Van Hook, 1986; Sexton & Bowman, 1983). As an example, Hills and
Welsch found high interest among business students in entrepreneurship (52%)
and entrepreneurship coursework (80%).
More recently, Henderson and Robertson (1999) collected data from young
adults aged 19–25 years who were studying entrepreneurship in Scotland, business students in England, and newly
hired employees at a major U.K. bank.
Not surprisingly, 67% of those studying
entrepreneurship expressed a desire for
self-employment, compared with 5%
among the rest.
In 1999, Sagie and Elizur reported the
findings from a study conducted among
students of small business and students
of business and economics. The purpose
of their study was to measure the
achievement motive among students
regarded as having high- and low-entrepreneurial orientations, respectively.
Sagie and Elizur found differences
among four achievement components
tested with small-business students tending to score higher than their business
and economics counterparts. Similarly,
Krueger and colleagues’ (2000) study to
compare two intentions-based models of
entrepreneurship activity focused on
data collected from undergraduate business students. DeMartino and Barbato
(2002) analyzed gender differences in
motivational factors among intending
entrepreneurs by studying career perceptions among Master of Business Administration (MBA) alumni of a U.S. toptier business school.
To summarize, a review of the literature suggests that there has been growing interest in entrepreneurship among
business students and the faculty members who teach them. To date, the
majority of published studies have
focused on the identifying characteristics (e.g., desire for self-employment),
related explanatory factors (e.g., prior
family business experience), and demographic differences (e.g., gender, race)
of students interested in entrepreneurship. Given the proliferation of entrepreneurship courses and curricula
offered by business schools in recent
years, the lack of research into the
entrepreneurial interest and intentions
among an interdisciplinary student population is surprising. In this study, we
attempted to understand interest in
entrepreneurship among nonbusiness
students and to explore similarities and
differences between them and their
business school counterparts.
Research Focus
A committee of business and engineering faculty members at Grand Valley State University, including the coauthors of this article, was charged with
exploring the potential for a program in
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entrepreneurship in the summer of
2003. The committee was quickly confronted with the issue of identifying a
target market. At first, it seemed obvious that it should be business and engineering students. However, as discussion unfolded, considerable anecdotal
information emerged about interdisciplinary students’ interest in starting their
own businesses. This led the committee
to conclude that, prior to establishing a
target market, it was essential to conduct research to determine levels of
interest among the university’s interdisciplinary population. Following the goal
of assessing the level of interest in new
ventures and new venture courses across
all university areas, the committee identified four important research questions:
1. To what extent do students across
the university population possess the
characteristics that are commonly
viewed as indicators of entrepreneurial
intent?
2. To what extent do students have an
interest in innovating new products or
services?
3. What is the level and extent of
interest in taking new venture courses
(i.e., entrepreneurship)?
4. Are there differences between BE
and NBE in regard to their entrepreneurial intent and interest in entrepreneurship curricula (Questions 2 and 3
above)?
METHOD
We conducted our study among all
students enrolled in courses during the
summer of 2003 at Grand Valley State
University. The faculty committee
developed and refined a questionnaire
and pretested it with a convenience sample of 50 students in the university’s student union. After refining and improving the questionnaire, we posted it on
Blackboard (a course management software; Blackboard, Inc., Washington,
DC) and announced it to the population
of students enrolled in summer classes
(approximately 5,000) via an e-mail
message. It should be noted that the university is rated among “America’s 100
Most Wired Universities” according to
Yahoo! Internet Life and is well known
for its use of innovative technology,
including in-class computer stations,
wireless connectivity in academic buildings, and Web-based instructional activities. Thus, each student has e-mail
access as well as a Blackboard account.
The mass e-mail directed students to a
site on Blackboard where they could
complete the 27-item questionnaire
electronically. We offered an incentive
for completing the survey; respondents
were entered into a drawing for one of
six $25 gift certificates redeemable at
the university bookstore.
The questionnaire contained 17 statements designed to measure interest in
entrepreneurship and characteristics of
entrepreneurs to which students responded to statements such as “I am a risk
taker” using a 5-point Likert scale (1 =
strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree).
The questionnaire also included specific
demographic descriptors, such as academic major and minor, academic rank,
and gender.
RESULTS
In total, 728 of the approximately
5,000 students enrolled in summer
courses responded to the e-mail and
completed surveys during a 1-week period in June 2003, representing a response
rate of nearly 15%. With respect to academic major and gender, we judged that
the sample was representative of the university’s student population during the
regular academic year.
Evidence of Interest in
Entrepreneurship
Using a 5-point Likert scale, respondents indicated their level of agreement
with two statements regarding a career
in entrepreneurship: (a) “I would like to
work for myself” and (b) “I would like
to start my own venture.” With respect
to the desire for self-employment,
38.7% (281 of 727) chose strongly
agree and 34.9% (254 of 727) chose
somewhat agree. Twenty-three percent
(167 of 727) of respondents indicated
they strongly agreed with the second
statement and 36.2% (263 of 727) said
they somewhat agreed with the statement. By combining the strongly agree
and somewhat agree responses, we
determined that a total of 73.6% (535 of
727) of students indicated that they
wanted to be self-employed and 59.1%
(430 of 727) expressed a desire to start
their own venture.
These statistics are higher than those
reported among U.S. students in nearly
all prior studies (e.g., Karr, 1988; Scott
& Twomey, 1988), as well as statistics
reported by DeMartino and Barbato
(2002) on the likelihood of MBA alumni of a top-tier business school becoming entrepreneurs in the short term.
Moreover, they provide a clear indication of overall interest in entrepreneurship across the university’s student population, both inside and outside of the
business school.
Academic Major
This finding led to analysis of the
academic disciplines among those students who were interested in starting a
business. Table 1 shows the percentage
of students, according to university academic discipline, who responded somewhat agree and strongly agree regarding
their level of interest in starting a business. We conducted an analysis of variance (ANOVA) that revealed no statistically significant differences between
academic major and interest in starting a
business. By inspection, however, the
highest levels of interest in starting a
business occurred outside the School of
Business, namely in the School of Nursing; the School of Social Sciences; the
School of Science and Mathematics,
which includes biology, biomedical and
health sciences, chemistry, computer
science and information systems, the
School of Engineering, geology, the
School of Health Professions, hospitality and tourism management, mathematics, movement science, physics, and statistics; the School of Education; and the
School of Arts and Humanities. Perhaps
this serves as an indication that those
who major in traditional business disciplines (e.g., marketing, management,
accounting, finance) tend to seek
employment within specialized departments in larger, more established firms,
as opposed to newer, smaller ones.
Chi-square testing failed to reveal a
difference between business and nonbusiness majors with respect to the
statement “I would like to start my own
venture” (see Table 2). We found that
both the number and the percentage of
NBE were higher than that of BE.
May/June 2006
277
TABLE 1. Student Interest in Starting a Business by Academic Major
Academic discipline
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School of nursing
Social sciences
Science and math
School of education
Arts and humanities
School of business
School of engineering
School of social work
Not specified b
Other disciplines
%a
Students (n)
65.5
64.3
60.9
60.7
56.7
53.5
45.9
33.3
—
69.3
81
98
184
56
104
143
24
3
22
13
Perceptions of New Venture
Opportunities
Note. N = 728.
a
Percentages shown are for the sum of somewhat agree and strongly agree responses. b22 students
did not identify a major.
TABLE 2. Student Interest in Starting a Business, Business Versus
Nonbusiness Majors
Student major
Businessa
Nonbusinessb
Total
Strongly
disagree
%
n
11.3
9.6
9.9
16
54
70
Somewhat
disagree
%
n
14.1
12.6
12.9
20
71
91
Neutral
%
n
21.1
17.1
17.9
30
96
126
Somewhat
agree
%
n
35.2
36.6
36.3
50
206
256
Strongly
agree
%
n
18.3
24.2
23.0
26
136
162
Note. N = 705. χ 2(4, N = 705) = 3.311 for a test of the null hypothesis that there was no difference
between a student’s major (business versus nonbusiness) and level of interest in starting a business.
a
n = 142. bn = 563.
In addition, we found that nearly 6%
of students currently owned a business.
It is interesting that the highest incidence
of business ownership was found within
the School of Social Sciences, wherein
7.1% of students sampled (7 of 98) indicated that they currently owned businesses, suggesting that entrepreneurship
holds appeal for certain segments of the
university’s student population.
Characteristics of Entrepreneurs
The survey contained six statements
describing characteristics of entrepreneurs to which students responded
using a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). The six
statements included the following: (a) I
am a risk taker; (b) I have an idea for a
new product or service; (c) I like to tinker with ideas for new products; (d) I
like to dream about new services; (e) I
278
Journal of Education for Business
found a higher percentage of agreement
among nonbusiness majors than among
business majors. Further ANOVA testing
failed to reveal any significant differences across academic disciplines.
have many ideas for possible new businesses or organizations; and (f) I am on
the alert for new venture ideas (see
Table 3).
First, we conducted an ANOVA to
determine if there was a significant difference between BE and NBE. We found
significant differences at .001 or higher
on all six characteristics, suggesting that
there were substantial differences in personal characteristics between students
who were intending entrepreneurs and
those who were not.
Next, we tested differences among
business and nonbusiness students with
regard to their level of agreement with
each of the six statements. We found statistically significant differences with
only two items: “I like to tinker with
ideas for new products,” F(703) = 4.035,
p = .045, and “I am on the alert for new
venture ideas,” F(703) = 5.309, p = .022.
With regard to the former statement, we
The questionnaire contained three
statements designed to measure students’ perceptions concerning new venture opportunities and the extent to
which they believed they should be
exposed to and encouraged to pursue
new venture opportunities: (a) There are
many opportunities for new businesses
in my major field(s) of study; (b) Students in my discipline should be
exposed to new venture opportunities;
and (c) University students are encouraged to pursue new ventures. Students
used a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly
disagree, 5 = strongly agree) to respond
to the statements. The survey results
revealed no statistically significant differences between business and nonbusiness students, F(703) = .235, p = .874,
on any of the three statements. Indeed,
students seemed to perceive opportunities for entrepreneurship across academic disciplines (e.g., “There are many
opportunities for new businesses in my
major field(s) of study,” F(8) = .432, p =
.902. Although the highest mean on this
particular item occurred among students
enrolled in the School of Social Work
(M = 3.33, SD = .58), because of the low
sample size (n = 3), these results should
be discounted. The next highest means
occurred among students enrolled in the
School of Nursing (M = 3.28, SD =
1.29), School of Social Sciences (M =
3.24, SD = 1.15) and the School of Business (M = 3.11, SD = 1.26). Once again,
these results suggest that students do not
perceive new venture opportunities to lie
exclusively within the business school;
instead, they are perceived to exist
throughout university disciplines.
Interest in Entrepreneurship
Courses
The questionnaire contained six
statements designed to measure students’ needs and perceptions concerning
support for entrepreneurship within the
university environment to which stu-
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dents responded using a 5-point Likert
scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). Overall, we found a moderate
positive correlation (r = .623, p = .000)
between students’ interest in starting a
new business and interest in taking
entrepreneurship courses.
Although there was not a statistically
significant difference at the .05 alpha
level between business and nonbusiness
majors on the item “I would like to take
(or would like to have taken) courses
about how to start a new venture,” the
calculated statistic, F(703) = 3.745, p =
.053, would seem to indicate marginal
significance. Moreover, the distribution
of means (shown in Table 4) suggests
that the strongest perceptions of the need
for entrepreneurship courses exist within
academic disciplines outside of the business school and engineering, the two
disciplines that most frequently offer
entrepreneurship courses and curricula.
Business and engineering students seem
to regard their traditional education as
adequate preparation for starting a new
business, should they choose to do so.
Interest in an Entrepreneurship
Program
We filtered the data to focus on those
students who were classified as “intending entrepreneurs” (i.e., those who indicated strongly agree or somewhat agree
with respect to level of interest in starting a new venture). Students were asked,
“If a new venture program is offered to
provide the basic skills and applied
work, I would be most interested in
_____.” Response options included (a) a
major (30 credit hours); (b) a minor (21
credit hours); (c) 1–3 courses; and (d) no
interest in a new venture course.
The distribution of responses is shown
in Table 5. From this, we concluded that
the majority of entrepreneurial-oriented
students at this particular university
wanted to take courses in entrepreneurship, although their preference was for
fewer courses and a minor over a major.
Through cross-tabulation and chi-square
testing, we failed to find evidence of an
association between major (i.e., business
or nonbusiness) and type of entrepreneurship program desired. Moreover, the
data suggest that students view an entrepreneurship curriculum as supporting
their already-selected majors in other
TABLE 3. Students’ Entrepreneurial Characteristics by Entrepreneurial
Intent
Entrepreneurial characteristic
Intending
(BE and NBE)
M
%
Nonintending
(BNE and
NBNE)
M
%
3.78
75.4
3.10
44.8
69.76
3.46
55.6
2.16
12.1
166.69
3.75
3.98
66.7
77.2
2.37
2.57
18.8
26.0
206.08
234.38
3.67
61.6
1.87
7.3
419.57
3.51
51.6
2.03
10.9
240.83
I am a risk taker.
I have an idea for a new product
or service.
I like to tinker with ideas for new
products.
I like to dream about new services.
I have many ideas for new
businesses or organizations.
I am on the alert for new venture
ideas.
F(593)
Note. N = 595. BE = business major entrepreneurs; NBE = nonbusiness major entrepreneurs; BNE
= business major nonentrepreneurs; NBNE = nonbusiness major nonentrepreneurs; Entrepreneurial Intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree (or somewhat disagree and
strongly disagree) responses to the question, “I would like to start my own venture.” Students who
were neutral about starting a business were excluded from this analysis.
TABLE 4. Mean Students’ Interest in Entrepreneurship Courses by
Entrepreneurial Intent
Academic discipline
Social sciences
Science and math
Arts and humanities
School of nursing
School of education
School of business
School of engineering
School of social worka
Other disciplines
Overall
Intending
M
n
4.16
3.94
4.08
4.00
4.00
3.83
3.55
4.00
4.33
3.99
63
112
59
53
34
76
11
—
9
417
Nonintending
M
n
2.65
2.40
2.38
1.88
2.38
2.33
2.57
1.00
3.00
2.39
20
43
21
16
13
36
7
—
4
160
F(8)
47.470*
72.084*
53.515*
60.215*
44.037*
44.598*
3.177**
—
6.769***
314.049*
Note. N = 577. Entrepreneurial intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree
(or somewhat disagree and strongly disagree) responses to the question, “I would like to start my
own venture.” Students who were neutral about starting a business were excluded from this analysis.
a
Because n = 3, there were too few cases to conduct this analysis.
*p = .000 **p = .094. ***p = .025.
disciplines, rather than a stand-alone or
second major, as was also suggested by
the preference for courses at the 100 and
200 levels.
DISCUSSION
The findings illustrate that a considerable percentage of students aspire toward
entrepreneurship, regardless of their academic discipline. From the data we gath-
ered, it appears as though the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well across the
university population (e.g., nursing,
social sciences, arts and humanities).
Indeed, these findings imply that entrepreneurial aspirations, as well as the perceived need for entrepreneurship training
or education, may be most fervent outside of the business school.
Consequently, this study suggests
that business schools look beyond their
May/June 2006
279
TABLE 5. Interest in Entrepreneurship Program Among Those Desiring
to Start a Business
BE
NBE
Entrepreneurship program type
n
%
n
%
Major (30 credit hours)
Minor (21 credit hours)
1–3 courses
No interest
Total
4
18
43
11
76
5.3
23.7
56.6
14.5
100.0
22
90
204
25
341
6.5
26.4
59.8
7.3
100.0
Downloaded by [Universitas Maritim Raja Ali Haji] at 22:07 12 January 2016
Note. N = 417. BE = business major entrepreneurs; NBE = nonbusiness major entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneurial intent was measured by adding somewhat agree and strongly agree responses to
the question, “I would like to start my own venture.” Students who were neutral about starting a
business were excluded from this analysis.
own internal constituents (i.e., majors)
if they, and their institutions, seek to
serve an interdisciplinary student population. This may entail reexamining
their definition of market scope to evaluate the roles that they might play in
supporting diverse academic majors.
Following this, it will be important to
develop a curriculum and courses that
are flexible enough to foster the dreams
of students whose hearts and academic
majors lie outside the business school.
This would undoubtedly require substantial discussion about admissions
standards and course prerequisites,
among other things. In this endeavor,
Diamond (1998) provided a useful
guide for course and curriculum design
and assessment.
Limitations
Although the distribution of academic
majors and gender of respondents in this
study was judged to be representative of
this university’s population of students,
incoming freshmen were underrepresented because of the timing of the study
(before new students had arrived on
campus). However, there is no reason to
believe that their opinions would have
been substantially different from other
freshmen and sophomores because we
failed to find evidence of significant difference by academic rank along items of
interest. Nevertheless, to ensure proper
representation of the student population
during the regular academic year, it
would be prudent to readminister the
study during the fall or spring semester.
280
Journal of Education for Business
Implications for Future Research
As noted, very little research exists
that explores entrepreneurialism among
nonbusiness students, yet interest in
entrepreneurship among these students is
substantial, as is the desire for a limited
number of courses to enable them to start
and operate new ventures. In designing
these courses, it seems imperative that an
array of basic entrepreneurship competencies is clearly articulated and woven
into learning outcomes and assessment
techniques, including (a) identification of
the “must-know” topics for aspiring nonbusiness entrepreneurs, both general
(e.g., communication, math, critical
thinking) and discipline specific (e.g.,
market analysis, promotion planning);
(b) the ways to most effectively support
interdisciplinary student learning (i.e.,
pedagogy); and (c) faculty deployment in
designing and teaching entrepreneurship
courses to nonbusiness students. Should
teaching entrepreneurship be the exclusive domain of business school faculty,
or should interdisciplinary faculty teams
be created to lead curriculum initiatives?
Finally, because this study was limited to students enrolled in a U.S. midwestern regional university, further
research that compares entrepreneurialism and interest in entrepreneurship at
other types of institutions, or in other
countries, would be fruitful.
NOTE
The authors thank Jaideep Motwani, Professor
and Chair of Management, and Harinder Singh,
Professor and Chair of Economics, at Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, MI.
Correspondence concerning this article should
be addressed to Nancy M. Levenburg, Department
of Management, Seidman College of Business,
Grand Valley State University, 441-C DeVos Center, 401 W. Fulton Street, Grand Rapids, MI 49504.
E-mail: levenbun@gvsu.edu
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