Entrep & Comm Dvlpmt

This course is designed to introduce students to the current and prospective roles of entrepreneurship in a community's economic development. It provides a guiding framework and common language for thinking about these roles and about appropriate and strategic interventions for fostering them. The course begins with an examination of current practices in community economic development regarding entrepreneurship, their attributes and their deficiencies. It then offers an alternative, systemic approach, viewing the communities economy as a pipeline of entrepreneurs and enterprises at various levels of skill development and companies at differing stages of the business life cycle. It explores how entrepreneurs and their businesses advance within this pipeline and the importance of maintaining a flow of entrepreneurial activity to community wealth building.