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Abstract

Background - World economies are demanding a new type of engineer—anentrepreneurial engineer—who possesses a multidisciplinary set of technical andentrepreneurial competencies. These new engineers are essential to the fostering ofentrepreneurship, innovation, and technological enhancement within an economy.Given the importance of having entrepreneurial engineers, it is necessary for tertiarylevelacademic institutions to prepare their engineering students to undertake theseroles. This is being done by offering entrepreneurship education to engineeringstudents.Limited research is available as to how academic institutions structureentrepreneurship initiatives for engineering students. The Standish-Kuon and Rice(2002) study was the only available research that showed the approaches taken bythe first academic institutions in the United States to educate engineeringundergraduates about entrepreneurship. The findings from this study also resulted inthe emergence of a typology which presented the three models to whichentrepreneurship initiatives could be categorized into, and ultimately the three modelsthat institutions could follow to educate their engineering students aboutentrepreneurship.In recognition of the importance of entrepreneurial engineers coupled with the needfor developing a greater understanding of entrepreneurship education for engineeringstudents, it has become necessary to review the types of initiatives used to educateengineering students about entrepreneurship. Doing this will help to determine therelevance of the Standish-Kuon and Rice (2002) typology regarding present-dayinitiatives. It is important to know whether this typology still represents the initiativesoffered at U.S. institutions and whether or not this typology can be applied in a nonU.S.context to show how engineering students in other countries are educated aboutentrepreneurship.Purpose - The purpose of this research was to acquire information about howtertiary-level academic institutions in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UnitedKingdom, and the United States are educating engineering undergraduates aboutentrepreneurship. The overall objective was to determine whether the Standish-Kuonand Rice (2002) typology was still representative of entrepreneurship initiatives forengineering undergraduates, or if the typology had to be updated.Design/Method - This research used a desktop review approach conducted in twophases. In the first phase, the data was collected from entrepreneurship initiativedescriptions on the websites of tertiary-level academic institutions in the UnitedStates. In the second phase, the data was collected from entrepreneurship initiativedescriptions on the websites of institutions in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, andthe United Kingdom. A content analysis was conducted, and the distinguishingcriteria identified in the Standish-Kuon and Rice (2002) typology were used tocategorize the entrepreneurship initiatives reviewed.Findings - The findings showed that a total of five models were used to categorizeentrepreneurship initiatives for engineering undergraduates. This demonstrates thatacademic institutions in the five countries use one (or in some cases more) of the fivemodels to educate engineering undergraduates about entrepreneurship. The presenceof the five models showed that the Standish-Kuon and Rice (2002) typology requiredupdating to reflect present-day initiatives for engineering undergraduates. Thesefindings, as a result, laid the foundation for the emergence of a new typology, whichwas subsequently entitled the Entrepreneurial Engineering Education, or EEE,typology.Conclusion - The Standish-Kuon and Rice (2002) typology, while still valuable,requires updates to represent the evolving educational needs of the engineering fieldand entrepreneurship education’s place in engineering. The need for extension hasresulted in a new typology, the EEE typology, which could ultimately be used toconduct future research that will enhance the field of entrepreneurial engineering andgain insight into entrepreneurial engineering education. Areas of interest for futureresearch are also discussed.

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Fraser, NKO and Miles, MP and Woods, M and Lewis, GK
Keywords:	entrepreneurship, education, engineering,
Journal or Publication Title:	The Journal of Engineering Entrepreneurship
Publisher:	The Journal of Engineering Entrepreneurship
ISSN:	2159-6948
Copyright Information:	Copyright 2017 The Journal of Engineering Entrepreneurship
Related URLs:	Google Scholar: Woods, M UTAS Profile: Woods, M Google Scholar: Lewis, GK UTAS Profile: Lewis, GK
Item Statistics:	View statistics for this item

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