You operated a lemonade stand every summer. You sold treats from your lunch box to kids on the playground. You raised way more money for new uniforms than your high school bandmates.
The new entrepreneurship degree at Kent State University might be for you.
KSU's College of Business Administration, which has been offering courses at its Center for Entrepreneurship and Business Innovation since 2006, will begin offering entrepreneurship as a major this fall.
The program will be limited to 30 students the first year, and Julie Messing, the entrepreneurship center's director, expects the enrollment process to be competitive.
The program also has been designed to be flexible for students who want a double major.
''We would encourage that,'' Messing said, seeing natural combinations with entrepreneurship such as technology, fashion or marketing.
Students who prefer to focus on the single major ''may be interested in the whole thought-making and decision-making process,'' she said. ''We really stress the entrepreneurial mindset.''
Graduates don't have to aspire to be their own boss, she added.
They could land in a large, innovative company that places a premium on managers who can think outside the box.
''There is so much pressure on these large organizations from smaller, more efficient, quicker-to-market companies that can make decisions easier,'' Messing said. Employees with entrepreneurial skills are quicker to exploit opportunities, exercise creativity and understand risk and reward.
Freshmen interested in the program must first take an Introduction to Entrepreneurship course. As sophomores, they may take two semesters of Entrepreneurial Experience, in which they will run their own businesses.
Juniors then accepted into the major will be expected to design and operate businesses on campus and, eventually, even in downtown Kent.
They also will have the opportunity to work with entrepreneurs who are looking for assistance with business and marketing plans, feasibility studies and other research projects.
More than 2,000 schools in the United States offer at least some classes in entrepreneurship, according to the Kauffman Foundation, a Kansas City, Mo., nonprofit that researches the topic. That's a tenfold increase in two decades.
The University of Akron offers it as a minor at its William T. and Rita Fitzgerald Institute for Entrepreneurial Studies.
Several area small schools also have programs. In 2006, the Kauffman Foundation and the Burton D. Morgan Foundation awarded grants to support entrepreneurship programs at several Northeast Ohio schools, including the College of Wooster, Baldwin-Wallace College, Hiram College, Lake Erie College and Oberlin College.
Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com.
