Recent Graduates' Perspectives on Innovation and Entrepreneurship and the Creation of New Entrepreneurship Course

Many Electrical and Computer Engineering students at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte showed an interest in entrepreneurship when interviewed during their senior exit interview. Several students highlighted the existence of a taste of innovation in our capstone senior design classes (SDI and SDII) and elaborated on the mechanism of entrepreneurship in our Professional Practice course, but they all agreed that the department was missing a dedicated course on innovation and entrepreneurship. This information encouraged us to conduct a survey to assess the true level of intensity. Two faculty from the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department interviewed students from the most recently completed Senior Design capstone course sequence to assess their perspectives on innovation and entrepreneurship. The faculty evaluated students ideas, compared the data from students who participated solely in industry supported projects versus students who worked on faculty sponsored projects. They analyzed this feedback and used it in the development of a new course for the benefit of future students. The survey was taken by thirty seven students; twenty two of them worked on an industry sponsored project, while fifteen students worked on faculty sponsored Senior Design projects. All thirty seven students were asked a specific set of questions geared toward identifying students’ knowledge in identifying new business concepts, identifying opportunity, analyzing the market for a new venture; and determining the sales and market strategy for a product. The results of the survey indicated the need for the students to learn about new venture opportunities, business concepts and strategies, and funding sources. The students also wanted to learn how to search for grant money from different sources. All these methods were incorporated into a new course “Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship” for Engineering students that was offered in our department for the first time in the spring 2013 semester. This course consisted of a mixture of graduate and undergraduate multidisciplinary students working on five projects; each project was unique, formed out of student or faculty ideas. Three out of the five teams projects continued working on the assigned project during their capstone senior design courses for the fall 2013-spring 2014 with a strong plan for commercialization of their product. These students were motivated, self-driven and excited about their projects and the possibility of launching a business successfully by using our program, and taking advantage of the resources available to them from our University’s Office of Technology Transfer. While this course gives a chance for our students to work with a faculty on the development of a new product, it will build a foundation for our engineering students to pursue a certificate in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at our Business school, if they wish. This course helped students identify opportunities to implement all ideas; helped the individual managed business growth, and provided methods of using critical thinking. This course was designed to be valuable for engineering students who plan to embark on the process of innovation and entrepreneurship while practicing engineering. P ge 24030.2