The University of Iowa

University of Iowa Announces New Entrepreneurship Major

The University of Iowa’s Tippie College of Business is offering a new major in entrepreneurship this Fall.

Students completing the new major will receive a Bachelor’s in Business Administration (BBA) degree in entrepreneurship.

“For Iowa’s economy to prosper, we need a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem and access to educated talent to help those businesses meet the challenges of a global economy,” Amy Kristof-Brown, dean of the Tippie College of Business, says in a press release. “This new major will prepare students to either launch or join existing companies and foster economic development at the community level.”

IOWA: HOME OF SMALL BUSINESSES

Nearly 99% of Iowa businesses are small business, according to the U.S. Small Business Administration, and Iowa’s small businesses employ nearly half of the state’s workers. Tippie is well-positioned to offer a comprehensive program in entrepreneurship. The business school is home to the John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Center (Iowa JPEC), which has been providing entrepreneurship education programs across campus and the state since 1996, including a number of entrepreneurial certificate programs.

“We’ve been a leader in campus-wide entrepreneurship education and making sure that students from all disciplines have access to entrepreneurship education,” David Hensley, Executive Director of the John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Center and Professor of Entrepreneurship, says. “With this new major, I think it was just the realization that we needed to provide students a more advanced, focused, impactful degree.”

Hensley, who led an interdisciplinary faculty committee to craft the curriculum, says that the new major provides students with the opportunity to hone several essential business skills through a unified curriculum. The interdisciplinary program will require classes from finance, marketing, management and entrepreneurship, as well as other departments in the college. Students will also complete Tippie’s general business course requirements and the university’s gen ed requirements. Tracks will be offered in entrepreneurial finance, technology entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial leadership, and new ventures.

“More and more students are doing side hustles. As the economy evolves, we want to better prepare our students to take some of those side hustles and turn them into scalable business opportunities,” he says. “The interest in entrepreneurship is as high as it’s ever been. It empowers people to pursue their own dreams.”

Sources: Iowa John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Center, The Daily Iowan