Research studies have shown that providing entrepreneurship education could broaden student career choices and perspectives. In addition, globalization has introduced intense competitions for employment and it is less likely that American students will continue to enjoy the plethora of employment opportunities. Students exposed to entrepreneurship focused courses demonstrate higher levels of self-efficacy and motivation, which in return, can potentially lead to successful entrepreneurial ventures making an impact on the nation’s economic growth. We report on the integration of entrepreneurship into a project-based first-year engineering course to encourage student innovation, and to develop student leadership and self-efficacy. A module featuring a series of lectures on entrepreneurship and business plan development were introduced as part of the curriculum. The module was further enhanced with the introduction of multiple company founders and industrial leaders who were invited to deliver presentations and interact with students regarding operations of engineering corporations. Students were required to present in teams on a new business idea related to the assigned engineering project of the course. Student learning was also assessed through surveys on the impact and effectiveness of integrating the entrepreneurship component into the first-year engineering class.
Liang (Lily) Wu is an Assistant Adjunct Professor at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of California, Irvine. She is also the Faculty Director of International Programs at the Henry Samueli School of Engineering. Dr. Wu is responsible for implementing, overseeing and assessing the first-year engineering program and international programs to enhance and support the engineering education at the School of Engineering. Dr. Wu received her Ph.D. degree in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of California, Irvine with primary research focuses on the design, development and integration of microfluidic systems for biomedical applications.
Gregory Washington is Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the Stacey Nicolas Dean of the Henry Samueli School of Engineering at the University of California Irvine. Professor Washington has been involved in multidomain research for the
Are you a researcher? Would you like to cite this paper? Visit the ASEE document repository at peer.asee.org for more tools and easy citations.