Top 50 Best Grad Programs for Entrepreneurs in 2021 The Princeton Review, in partnership with Entrepreneur, ranks the top undergraduate programs.
In normal times, top-tier entrepreneurship programs are focused on the fundamentals - teaching their students everything from budgeting to leadership. But in these unpredictable times, the schools are also serving as a touchpoint for their budding entrepreneurial communities: They're providing information on things like lending programs and workplace safety, hosting virtual town halls, setting up emergency funds for students, and helping their students support the communities they live in. In other words, these schools are living their message - shifting and adapting the way any entrepreneur must.
Entrepreneurship doesn't require a degree, of course, but programs like these can arm students with the skills they need to succeed. It's why for the past 15 years we have partnered with The Princeton Review to rank the top undergraduate and graduate programs for entrepreneurs. This year's survey considered more than 250 colleges and universities in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Europe, and evaluated a multitude of factors. We took into account not just the school's programming but also its graduates' success rates in the business world, the number of mentors available for students, and more. See which
schools made the grade. (To read more about our methodology, pick up our Dec. 2020 issue of Entrepreneur.)
Ahmet K | Getty Images1. Rice University
Rice University
Liu Idea Lab for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship
Houston, Texas
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 29
Tuition: $63,162
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 297
What Sets Us Apart
Our entrepreneurship program emphasizes experiential learning and cross-disciplinary collaboration. Our classes are designed to ensure students get hands-on experience, working in teams, with industry leaders, and community partners on real-world projects. Our students are investing real money, are building solutions for physicians sourced directly from the medical district across the street, and they are solving design challenges for our alumni-owned companies. And through these projects, we facilitate interdisciplinary connections, ensuring teams are well rounded in terms of experience and expertise. Our programs and courses combine students from across degree programs and schools and we are collaborating with other departments, such as Bioengineering, to help students interested in healthcare innovation build medical solutions via teams of clinical, bioengineering, and business students. We cater to all graduate students, emphasizing the importance of the entrepreneurial mindset. Students are identifying an unmet need, prototyping hypothesis-driven solutions, acquiring customer and user feedback on the proposed solutions, testing hypotheses and conducting evidence-based iterations, and communicating novel and transformative ideas to diverse stakeholders. Whether our students will pursue finance, consulting, or marketing, we believe every student will benefit from mastering these skills.
University of Chicago2. The University of Chicago
The University of Chicago
Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Chicago, Illinois
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 38
Tuition: $59,753
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 416
What Sets Us Apart
Since 1998, the Polsky Center and Chicago Booth has pioneered new areas of study in entrepreneurial education, such as entrepreneurial sales, entrepreneurial discovery, Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition, and others. Our distinct approach to entrepreneurship education is a result of our commitment to the following principles: (1) Our entrepreneurship education must be led by a mix of both research and practitioner faculty, (2) a blend of both classroom and experiential learning, (3) student-facing, and (4) rooted in a passion for new venture creation. Students from a variety of backgrounds find success in our courses because the educational approach is multidisciplinary. We will train anyone – scientist, philosopher, business student, or innovator with no University affiliation – in the skills necessary to be an entrepreneur. In addition, programs are increasingly open to students and researchers across campus – bringing MBAs and scientists together to innovate and tackle the toughest problems facing society. Additionally, Chicago Booth is unique because of its flexible course curriculum and the opportunity for students to "decelerate" their degree. Students can decelerate, or slow-down their degree, allowing them the ability to step back from their studies in order to focus on growing their business. As a result of these experiential learning programs and flexible curriculum, students gain valuable, lifelong skills, which prepare them for the entirety of their careers.
stevegeer | Getty Images3. Northwestern University
Northwestern University
The Larry and Carol Levy Institute for Entrepreneurial Practice
Evanston, Illinois
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 50
Tuition: $75,134
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 109
What Sets Us Apart
Our New Venture Creation, Growth & Scaling and Corporate Innovation curriculum is designed to support students wherever they are in their entrepreneurial journey, and meet their professional goals, whether that's launching a venture, growing and scaling an enterprise, or leading innovation within an established organization. The New Venture track offers a three-course "Discover. Test. Launch" experience where students develop and start businesses. Typically, 300 students enroll and about 30 ventures emerge annually. The Growth & Scaling track is for students interested in joining a fast-growing enterprise, acquiring an existing business with a view toward rapid enterprise value growth, or executing growth initiatives in the context of a family-owned business. The Growth Strategy Practicum course gives students the opportunity to work on a project with a growth-stage enterprise. Corporate Innovation courses have evolved to focus on creative thinking to drive innovation. The track provides a diverse curriculum in branding, strategy, product management and the management of innovation, and offers hands-on experiences in collaborating with innovation labs worldwide. Our faculty include local venture capitalists and serial entrepreneurs. Additionally, we collaborate with the Schools of Law, Engineering, Medicine, Journalism, Performing Arts and undergraduates via the NUvention courses and our two commercialization courses.
Babson College4. Babson College
Babson College
Arthur M. Blank Center for Entrepreneurship
Babson Park, Massachusetts
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 39
Tuition: $71,564
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 465
What Sets Us Apart
Babson College educates entrepreneurial leaders who create great economic and social value everywhere. Entrepreneurship is more than an academic discipline at Babson; it is a way of life. We teach entrepreneurship as a method so that students practice Entrepreneurial Thought and Action® (ET & A) in a variety of curricular and co-curricular settings, both on campus and around the world. Entrepreneurship is a required course for every single Babson student, and 70% of students take one of more than 70 electives. Babson College has the largest dedicated entrepreneurial faculty in the world. The entrepreneurship department has 51 faculty members; 23 full-time academics and 28 adjuncts, 100% of whom have both entrepreneurial and teaching experience. We have trained over 5,000 faculty from all over the world in our unique pedagogy of teaching entrepreneurship, in our Price Babson Entrepreneurship Educators Program. Our campus is a living/learning laboratory, with five entrepreneurial centers where students can pursue their passions for social innovation, start-ups, family entrepreneurship, women-led entrepreneurship, and food solutions, in accelerators, laboratories and other immersive experiences. The new Weissman Foundry is a unique prototyping and experimentation lab for our students. Babson's entrepreneurial culture encourages faculty, staff, students, and alumni to be entrepreneurial leaders all the time, exploring, pursuing and growing initiatives and ventures.
OlegAlbinsky | Getty Images5. University of Michigan
University of Michigan
Ross School of Business, Zell Lurie Institute; College of Engineering, Center for Entrepreneurship
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 75
Tuition: $66,376 (in-state); $71,376 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 426
What Sets Us Apart
At the University of Michigan, an entrepreneurial mindset is an essential shift in the perception of failure and opportunity, orienting our graduate students toward systems thinking, sparking creativity and innovation inside and outside the classroom. Our contemporary approach to delivering an entrepreneurial education is a strategic model focused on action-based learning that reaches far beyond the basics of creating a business. With a broad mix of in-depth programs, cross-campus collaboration connecting students from our 19 schools and colleges, U-M students are immersed in an experiential approach to entrepreneurial education. Courses and opportunities outside of class support the entrepreneurial core that allows students to study the fundamentals of entrepreneurship while putting their knowledge into practice. Our students launch companies, invest real dollars in new ventures, intern for entrepreneurs globally, advise growing startups, participate in our business accelerator, and more.
Entrepreneurship is an interdisciplinary pursuit with opportunities in many fields, including engineering, natural sciences, medicine, education, and more. Pursuing these opportunities requires building a team with a diverse knowledge base, including but not limited to management, technology, law, and finance. U-M works to join these students, through graduate-level course offerings and programs, to produce successful and well-rounded ventures that explore fresh and innovative ideas.
The University of Texas at Austin6. The University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin
Texas Master of Science in Technology Commercialization; Texas MBA Programs
Austin, Texas
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 48
Tuition: $49,534 (in-state); $54,924 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 81
What Sets Us Apart
We leverage the Austin ecosystem with unique, hands-on programs that extend across graduate programs on campus and the greater Austin startup community. Students can go deep on their own startup, covering the early-stage life cycle of venture creation, funding and launch before graduating. We also provide students hands-on opportunities to work with local area startups going through the same life cycles of venture creation, funding and launch, and including follow-on financing, so they can experience all these steps in real-time across multiple companies before graduating.
A strong component of our ecosystem is new technologies. Our entrepreneurship students spend extensive time on new technologies recently developed at The University of Texas, Texas A&M Univ., and NASA. They perform in-depth assessments on these technologies and prepare business plans and launch plans for the most attractive ones. Each year several teams license the technologies they have analyzed. As an example, one team recently became enthusiastic about a heat-absorbing paint technology that could be used to reduce energy costs. They wrote a business plan focusing on the housing market, licensed the technology from NASA, and had sales before they graduated. From zero knowledge to first sales took only ten months.
gregobagel | Getty Images7. University of Washington
University of Washington
Arthur W. Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship
Seattle, Washington
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 80
Tuition: $35,334 (in-state); $51,531 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 327
What Sets Us Apart
We Grow Entrepreneurs. Throughout more than 150 years of history, UW has demonstrated an extraordinary track-record of inventions and discoveries with impact across the globe. In 2019 alone, UW drove $15.7 billion in economic activity for the region and is consistently ranked the most innovative public university in the world. UW entrepreneurship education and programming work in symbiosis with Seattle—one of the top startup ecosystems in the world. Students are given the access and opportunity to participate in programs from global leaders such as Amazon Catalyst and Microsoft's Global Social Entrepreneurship program.
UW features a unique Accelerator experience compared to peer schools. The Jones + Foster Accelerator isn't an academic experience—it's a six-month program for student teams ready to become early-stage startups. Since 2010, more than 85% of those who received seed funding from the Accelerator are still in business today. In addition to rigorous, interdisciplinary coursework in entrepreneurship, we offer many ways for graduate students to engage outside of the classroom for hands-on, experiential learning opportunities. Entrepreneurship students work in areas such as the Institute for Protein Design, the Clean Energy Institute, as well as Fellowships in technology commercialization and social entrepreneurship. The Maritime Innovation Center, CoMotion's FinTech Incubator, and a Biomedical Entre Center all offer highly innovative experiences for graduate students.
Brian Bahr | Getty Images8. The University of Oklahoma
The University of Oklahoma
Tom Love Center for Entrepreneurship
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 23
Tuition: $16,229 (in-state); $33,804 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 54
What Sets Us Apart
It is the combination of two factors that make graduate entrepreneurship education at OU distinctive. First, OU places a strong emphasis on innovation—it is a major university-wide theme. The MBA program facilities are located in Oklahoma City in the heart of the OKC Innovation District and adjacent to the OU Health Sciences Center. This proximity to centers of technological and scientific advances provides many opportunities for students to learn from and network with leading innovators. Interacting with faculty and post-docs who are commercializing technologies emerging from university labs provides MBA students with practical experiences. Second, the Tom Love Division of Entrepreneurship and Economic Development links the development of new ventures with the economic development goals of the state of Oklahoma. The focus on business development and job creation expands the scope and purpose of the entrepreneurship program. OU's entrepreneurial ecosystem—which includes the Tom Love Center for Entrepreneurship, the Irani Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth and the Tom Love Innovation Hub—has expertise and facilities to support every kind of entrepreneurship and economic development endeavor. When these resources are combined with an aspiration to use entrepreneurship, innovation and strategic venture development in the interest of effective economic development, graduate students have a unique opportunity to join in catalyzing economic growth through entrepreneurship.
Robyn Beck | Getty Images9. University of California—Los Angeles
University of California—Los Angeles
Harold and Pauline Price Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation
Los Angeles, California
Number of Courses Offered: 45
Tuition: $70,013
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 107
What Sets Us Apart
Our comprehensive approach allows us to reinforce curriculum topics with active learning outside of the classroom. We've offered experiential fellowships for 40 years, and a wide range of speaker programs, roundtables and conferences in which students can interact with and learn from entrepreneurs at all stages. We believe that entrepreneurship includes developing both a mindset and management skills that help entrepreneurs to manage risk across a wide range of settings. Our students interact with entrepreneurs in the UCLA and Los Angeles ecosystems, as well as with students and faculty in UCLA's 11 professional schools, providing many opportunities for collaboration, growth and innovation. Our growing set of health care innovation offerings are particularly well suited to Los Angeles and market needs, and our Accelerator and Business Creation Option programs allow students to test their skills, learn and adapt, prior to launching their ventures.
The University of Texas at Dallas10. The University of Texas at Dallas
The University of Texas at Dallas
UTD Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Richardson, Texas
Number of Courses Offered: 29
Tuition: $17,229 (in-state); $32,262 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 319
What Sets Us Apart
- "Experiential learning" focused on launching startups, commercializing IP, partnering with large companies and nonprofits, or internships, etc.
- Close partnering with the external entrepreneurial community including hosting joint programs, scheduling regular drop-in office hours for industry mentoring, and hosting Startup Internship and Career Fairs.
- The IIE hosts multiple outstanding events each semester. The Emerging Technologies Summit on Autonomous vehicles in April 2020 featured Co-Founder of Intel-Acquired MobilEye ($3billion).
- Focus on"continuous improvement". This is reflected in numerous ways, including: a) growth in the number of participants in our Big Idea Competitions (over 45 graduate teams are now competing each fall), b) our ability to build our ENTP courses into other degree programs, and c) receipt of multiple program awards.
- UTD alumni startups and spinout companies continue to do well and raise additional rounds of funding (CerSci Therapeutics and Adaptive 3D)
- UTD's program continues to grow, including expanding the UTD incubator facility a third time to over 35,000 square feet with 24 UTD spinout companies residing.
- UTD is a "tier 1" university now in Texas receiving over $120 million in research funding each year, with commercialization processes being developed.
- Partnering with sister university UT Southwestern Medical for biomedical startup development, and also with UT Arlington in a new Venture Mentor Service (MIT) for mature startups.
DenisTangneyJr | Getty Images11. Northeastern University
Northeastern University
NU Center for Entrepreneurship Education
Boston, Massachusetts
Number of Courses Offered: 75
Tuition: $44,605
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 203
What Sets Us Apart
Northeastern University has been an innovator since creating its program in 1958. A reason for this is that we have always considered entrepreneurship to be a legitimate academic field. We tenured our first professor in entrepreneurship in 1973. We have tenure-track faculty who create courses on their cutting-edge research. These faculty also create the textbooks for the courses, so we are creating pedagogy rather than just teaching what others have developed. The first NU entrepreneurship text was published in 1968. Entrepreneurship at NU is interdisciplinary, not only within the business school but also across campus. NU created the first free-standing school of entrepreneurship in 2001 in order to affect interdisciplinary activities with tenure-track faculty among five of our colleges. Our students work in cross-disciplinary teams regularly in class and become accustomed to doing so when they start their ventures. Likewise, the teachers are put together in cross-disciplinary teams to teach the courses. We have, for example, courses taught by music and entrepreneurship professors, another by design and business professors. Finally, we emphasize student leadership: The programs in the NU entrepreneurship ecosystem are all run by the students themselves. NU's approach to entrepreneurship education, therefore, is distinctive because it is part of our DNA, it is tied to experiential learning globally, it is interdisciplinary and it has an ecosystem driven by the students.
DenisTangneyJr | Getty Images12. Brigham Young University
Brigham Young University
Rollins Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology
Provo, Utah
Number of Courses Offered: 29
Tuition: $13,450 (LDS); $26,120 (non-LDS)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 190
What Sets Us Apart
After careful review, we believe we may have the finest integrated core for teaching entrepreneurship in the world. The curriculum reflects the latest academic thinking and research in the field and is augmented with real-world experiential learning components and frameworks. Our curriculum is deeply rooted in lean startup and design thinking principles and practices. In fact, we were one of the first universities to comprehensively adopt this approach in our entrepreneurship education. To this day, many schools around the world continue to teach their students to write static and outdated business plans instead of identifying, testing and pivoting on key business model hypotheses. Lean methodologies help entrepreneurs operate more effectively and efficiently within the areas of uncertainty that they face every day as they search for a repeatable and scalable business model and aim to achieve product/market fit. This approach is allowing us to educate smarter entrepreneurs who launch validated ventures that last. Our secret sauce is a combination of cutting-edge academic offerings and deep mentoring. We also recently launched a new venture studio program called Blue Forge Studio. While venture studios are popping up these days in industry, we believe this may be the first program of its kind on a university campus. It is designed to provide startups with access to critical human capital and expertise versus financial capital.
Syracuse University | Facebook13. Syracuse University
Syracuse University
Blackstone Launchpad powered by TechStars; Couri Hatchery
Syracuse, New York
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 30
Tuition: $49,868
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 158
What Sets Us Apart
Entrepreneurship and cross-campus commitment are academic signatures of Syracuse University. While the numbers provided above represent the Whitman School's offerings as part of the Entrepreneurship & Emerging Enterprises program, the cross-campus numbers are greater. This cross-campus commitment to entrepreneurship results in many student ventures starting and growing every year, thousands of students enrolled in entrepreneurship courses, many full-time faculty involved in programming and dozens of community-based experiential opportunities for students. The Chancellor recently announced a $100M investment in scholarship, and entrepreneurship is central to that. We also recently launched a centralized incubator and resource center (Blackstone Launchpad) to provide additional help across campus and there is a push for additional new faculty in the coming years. In addition, we've worked with more than 120,000 military veterans the past few years, helping to manage their transition to civilian life, and have been acknowledged for this at the highest levels of government and private industry. The Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities has been in existence since 2007 and is now offered at 10 universities around the United States, inspiring similar programs in other countries.
University of Rochester14. University of Rochester
University of Rochester
University of Rochester Ain Center for Entrepreneurship
Rochester, New York
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 45
Tuition: $47,212
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 59
What Sets Us Apart
Graduate students at the University of Rochester are encouraged to step outside of their specialized areas of study to participate in a broader entrepreneurial ecosystem. Two of UR's key values are openness and leadership — both traits that serve entrepreneurs well. Different sectors of the university are leaders among their counterparts. Eastman School of Music encourages their graduate students to think not only as musicians, but also creative entrepreneurs; the School of Nursing runs a one-of-a-kind Center for Nursing Entrepreneurship. The Warner School of Education is equally innovative, offering a distinctive Entrepreneurial Skills for Educators course, and the MS in TEAM program combines STEM and entrepreneurship curricula, serving as a model for new interdisciplinary entrepreneurship master's programs, both within and beyond the University of Rochester. The vast majority of the entrepreneurship offerings — curricular and co-curricular — at U of R are open to all graduate students, allowing individuals to meet other like-minded innovators and share new perspectives frequently. Adaptability and familiarity with the different facets of entrepreneurship is the University of Rochester's strength, and these connections among disciplines are fundamental to UR's success.
Washington University in St. Louis15. Washington University in St. Louis
Washington University in St. Louis
Skandalaris Center for Interdisciplinary Innovation & Entrepreneurship
St. Louis, Missouri
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 47
Tuition: $63,765
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 89
What Sets Us Apart
Entrepreneurship is an educational pillar for Olin Business School. Entrepreneurship education at WashU is characterized by its interdisciplinary approach, focus on experiential learning, and rigorous standards for all academic outputs. Those same standards are reflected in the co-curricular education provided by the Skandalaris Center for Interdisciplinary Innovation and Entrepreneurship, which encourages students to take action on new ideas and become creative problem solvers well-suited for today's changing economy. While many students choose to enroll in entrepreneurial programs with the goal of starting ventures, many others seek to bring an entrepreneurial mindset into corporations and non-profits. Any student studying entrepreneurship at Olin Business School, and WashU as a whole, cannot leave our institution without interacting with students from other disciplines and the region at large. All of our Olin graduate students, regardless of academic focus, engage with entrepreneurship through an elective course, an immersive case experience or a hands-on startup consulting opportunity. This separates Olin from peer institutions, as we have a holistic approach to entrepreneurship education.
University of Utah16. University of Utah
University of Utah
Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute
Salt Lake City, Utah
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 29
Tuition: $30,500
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 130
What Sets Us Apart
Our approach to entrepreneurship education is unique in its pedagogy, academic strengths, and vast resources available to students. First, we teach students how to experiment and pivot, not to focus on creating business plans. Second, we teach students the principles of lean startup and modern methods of fundraising such as crowdsourcing, because large amounts of capital are no longer required. Third, we believe students should learn by doing – including starting businesses while in college. Fourth, we believe successful entrepreneurship is a team activity requiring many types of people – not the product of a "lone genius." The Master of Business Creation has specific learning objectives to students will use in their real-world startups such as executing fast-cycle-time learning, navigating ambiguity, leading innovation, and mastering complex analysis and problem-solving. MBC students have a unique opportunity to get a credentialed degree for time and work put towards their startups. Our academic strength includes how we merge award-winning entrepreneurship and strategy faculty, creating a blended department and giving students a broader understanding of value creation, and business formation and development. Our courses focus on helping students develop skills essential to success: market entry, competitive advantage, supply chain management, digital marketing, data analytics, and fundraising.
North Carolina State University17. North Carolina State University
North Carolina State University
Poole College of Management
Raleigh, North Carolina
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 26
Tuition: $25,797 (in-state); $43,608 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 73
What Sets Us Apart
The Technology Entrepreneurship and Commercialization (TEC) focus within the Jenkins MBA Program allows students to choose two different paths: one focused on the commercialization of intellectual property — developing that into a product, good or service; the other taking a more traditional approach to entrepreneurship. Perhaps the most interdisciplinary arm of the MBA program, the commercialization focus is about half MBA students and half master's and PhD students from other university programs. North Carolina State University ranks in the top 10 in terms of patent generation, yet most of those patents sit on the shelf. Students and faculty with a focus on commercialization are the arm that gets those patents off the shelf and into new businesses as products, goods and services. For those who choose the commercialization path, the applied, practical program ensures the production of new business startups is part of each student's educational experience. Students can expect to learn about technology opportunity analysis, building their own pool of technologies from real intellectual property and finding ways to create ideas and explore potential high growth business opportunities. NC State's entrepreneurship curriculum promotes critical thinking that allows students to either develop and launch their own concepts or become valuable team members and leaders in new ventures and larger organizations.
18. University of South Florida
University of South Florida
Center for Entrepreneurship
Tampa, Florida
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 86
Tuition: $8,537 (in-state); $16,472 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 48
What Sets Us Apart
Our approach to graduate entrepreneurship education is focused on learning about basic concepts, tools and processes in a classroom setting and then learn experientially how they are applied in a specific setting. We work closely with the Small Business Development Center at University of South Florida (USF) which supplies four to five real small companies to several courses in the program and which are then paired with four or five student teams. Students work on well-defined problems that the entrepreneurs are struggling with, and throughout the semester, they meet with the entrepreneurs to gather feedback, ask for guidance and touch base with the instructor to develop alternative solutions to the problem. We also introduce simulation games into our coursework, that mimics the creation of a new company in a highly competitive market. Student teams are competing with each other for financial capital, talent and market share. Finally, we have a Student Innovation Incubator that further solidifies experiential learning in the program. We also believe that entrepreneurship education should exhibit a global dimension, and to that end, we offer a study abroad program focused on International Entrepreneurship and offer our graduate program jointly with the Ca'Foscari University of Venice in Italy. Students, if they elect to do so, can spend one semester in Italy to complete the requirements of their master's program.
Coleman Entrepreneurship Center19. DePaul University
DePaul University
Coleman Entrepreneurship Center
Chicago, Illinois
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 49
Tuition: $45,468
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 84
What Sets Us Apart
DePaul was one of the earliest founders of entrepreneurship education in the US with the first entrepreneurship course offered in 1971. We now offer a combined bachelor's and master's degree in Entrepreneurship (four years plus one). Fortune Small Business magazine ranked our innovation programming among the "top 10 innovative programs for business owners." The entrepreneurship program collaborates with DePaul's CDM College one of the largest computer science schools in the nation, for joint programming-technology commercialization. We participated in the Small Business Institute program starting in 1972 and received Best Model Program Award from USASBE. Partners in the entrepreneur ecosystem in Chicago include1871 tech incubator, 2112 music/film incubator, Blue1647 tech incubator and individual members at mHub maker-space. The Coleman Fellows, 100-member Campus Advisory Team from across the university and 76 CEC Mentors implement entrepreneurship education across all DePaul colleges. Student entrepreneurship organizations include CEO. The CEC's Startup Internship Program pays DePaul students to work in startups over a summer. Our spring business plan competition, The Purpose Pitch, focuses on the cause behind forming business and strength of purpose beyond just making money. Over 80 student/alumni teams applied, and the final six teams presented to over 300 people. DePaul and the CEC, along with IIT hosted the 2018 GCEC Conference in Chicago and is a leadership school member.
The University of Tampa20. The University of Tampa
The University of Tampa
John P. Lowth Entrepreneurship Center
Tampa, Florida
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 10
Tuition: $14,075
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 27
What Sets Us Apart
The program was designed using a cluster and competencies approach. We used a twofold approach. First, based upon research conducted with experts, we identified the key topics that need to be addressed in an advanced degree program in entrepreneurship. We then clustered those topics into groups to create eight clusters. Each of these was then named and identified as a course in the program. All are four-hour credits for a total of 32 hours. The ability to take the entire program in one year is a significant advantage that aligns with the urgency of entrepreneurship.
University of California San Diego21. University of California San Diego
University of California San Diego
California Institute for Innovation and Development
La Jolla, California
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 29
Tuition: $51,453 (in-state); $54,968 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 90
What Sets Us Apart
The Rady School's approach to entrepreneurship education is unique in its focus on collaboration. Students collaborate in the classroom, with corporate and community partners, research institutions, and academic units across the UC San Diego campus. Uniquely positioned in the heart of San Diego's life science industry, the school engages with the entire San Diego innovation ecosystem, which is flourishing in the life science, technology and healthcare IT industries, to provide a comprehensive entrepreneurial experience for its students. While at the Rady School, students can participate in a variety of programs designed to enable collaborative opportunities. The school's StartR Accelerator program, which provides current students and alumni the opportunity to participate in focused, hands-on company development, matches teams with mentors experienced with entrepreneurship and working with startups. Students can also participate in the StartR Inclusion program, which fosters entrepreneurship in under-served populations by matching teams with mentors and advisors. In addition, students can take part in the Rady Venture Fund, a student-run venture capital fund that pairs students with seasoned venture investors and provides real capital to startup companies.
22. Saint Louis University
Saint Louis University
Chaifetz Center for Entrepreneurship
St. Louis, Missouri
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 78
Tuition: $52,475
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 67
What Sets Us Apart
Keeping with our Jesuit roots ("Men and women for and with others") and Princeton Review's No. 2-ranked school for service, we teach how to create social and non-profit ventures as well as for-profit ones, and to help others do this as well as how to pursue entrepreneurship for yourself. To make entrepreneurship education available to graduate students who might want this for their futures, we have grown it far beyond the business school, delivering the education and experiential training where they are academically based, to prepare them for the entrepreneurial roles they will pursue in their professional careers. This means teaching students not only in management, but also in 23 other departments about how to identify opportunities and launch startups. Our network of 50+ faculty across the campus collaborate to connect students to an extensive set of resources on campus (instructors, mentors, advisors, competitions, clinics, labs, centers, coworking spaces, shareduse kitchens, maker spaces, accelerators, etc.) as well as locally off-campus (in one of the top-10 startup cities in the USA — with all that implies) to help students achieve their goals and dreams. We connect students nationally through programs like our MedLaunch Medical Accelerator, the SXSW Student Startup Madness and our own HALO-ranked Billiken Angels Network to help them access funding and expertise nationally.
VW Pics | Getty Images23. University of Maryland
University of Maryland
Academy for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
College Park, Maryland
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 32
Tuition: $45,499 (in-state); $54,409 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 79
What Sets Us Apart
Innovation and entrepreneurship (I&E) is the highest strategic priority of the President of the University of Maryland. I&E at UMD is not limited to just the business and engineering schools. In fact, non-business and non-engineering students are every bit as important to include in the innovation process because that process isn't as rich and has inferior outcomes without that diversity. For that reason, UMD launched the Academy for I&E in 2013 that reports directly to the President and the Provost with a campus-wide purview and mission to engage all 40,000 students in all 12 colleges and schools in I&E. UMD is now about 50 percent of the way there through extensive campus-wide collaboration across every school and college, as well as systematic embedding of I&E modules in many required general education and pre-requisite courses for certain majors. We view entrepreneurship as a way of thinking, doing and being that can be applied to most aspects of work and life. It is an exercise in self-expression, team-building and problem-solving in order to create new value in the world. The study and practice of entrepreneurship helps students build self-confidence and develop important personal skills in areas like creativity and leadership. Students learn concepts and methods like need-finding, opportunity recognition, value creation, design thinking, business modeling and project planning and management. These can be applied throughout their careers.
Temple University | Facebook24. Temple University
Temple University
Innovation and Entrepreneurship Institute
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 41
Tuition: $20,600 (in-state); $37,600 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 28
What Sets Us Apart
We start with innovation & E-ship, which are two sides of the same coin. TU's university-wide programming balances perspective-shifts and entrepreneurial-mindset to recognize opportunities and develop differentiated, innovation-based, purpose-focused, value-creating business models. At the same time, we teach the practical skills and behaviors that help students fund and launch ventures or implement their vision in existing orgs. Next, our academic and co-curricular programs are strategically integrated, focused on experiential learning and launching. We say "Don't come to TU to learn about entrepreneurship, come to TU to launch your venture!" The best time to launch a venture is as a student since learning is enhanced by application (testing ideas/launching ventures). We also leverage general education courses (e.g., core CLA Intellectual Heritage courses that teach creativity and social e-ship, environment science/tech genEd use field trips to sustainable e-ship ventures) to transform core curriculum in schools and colleges (e.g., 8 BFA degrees include e-ship, engineering capstone courses include tech comm and lean startup, innovation/entrepreneurship concentrations are largest in the MBA). Last is the Entrepreneurship Academy: TUEA is a novel approach to training faculty and funding/co-developing new courses and programs, which is transforming TU. TUEA created specialized programs in freelancing, urban healthcare, sports innovation, entrepreneurship engineering, social entrepreneurship, product development, licensing and retail, etc.
Andy Lyons | Getty Images25. University of Louisville
University of Louisville
Forcht Center for Entrepreneurship
Louisville, Kentucky
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 12
Tuition: $32,000
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 6
What Sets Us Apart
None Provided
26. Texas A&M University, College Station
Texas A&M University, College Station
McFerrin Center for Entrepreneurship
College Station, Texas
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 20
Tuition: $42,462 (in-state); $61,498 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 29
What Sets Us Apart
Our approach to graduate entrepreneurship education is unique in that it focuses on real-world, experiential opportunities. All of our programs are extracurricular so we minimize traditional instruction and rather use a flipped classroom to educate them on lean startup and other business principles. We then create an environment in which the students are exposed to different trends and opportunities in entrepreneurship and those with ideas can gather data to evaluate customer and market needs. Our environment encourages creativity, the exchange of ideas/talent and multi/cross-disciplinary collaboration amongst the students. Peer feedback and leadership are also integral to our programs, and we leverage an extensive mentor network that enables students to seek feedback and learn from the experience of other entrepreneurs, business professionals and entrepreneurial faculty and staff at Texas A&M. At our center, students are encouraged to learn but are also provided with the ability to earn access to advanced programs and resources (including financial support) that can help them to launch their own companies. With this approach, we are able to focus resources that support the diverse needs of the entrepreneurial students on campus, ranging from those without ideas who want to use their skills to help others to those who are already running a business or participating in other, college- or topically-focused entrepreneurship programs.
27. The George Washington University
The George Washington University
Center for Entrepreneurial Excellence
Washington, D.C.
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 8
Tuition: $52,826
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 39
What Sets Us Apart
First, we integrate course work with field-based learning. Second, we ensure that all students have access to all the resources available through the GWU Entrepreneurial Ecosystem. Third, we augment class discussions with visiting entrepreneurs, policymakers, economic development professionals — especially those in the social entrepreneurial market segment — to present real-world examples and in some cases, offer employment opportunities. Fourth, we move traditional teaching to a field-based, heuristic method of learning. Fifth and finally, given GWU's unique location, we provide students with a wide selection of policy and social entrepreneurship experiences. Among these were GWU's partner, the International Council for Small Business (ICSB), which works with the United Nations and, on June 26th, declared Micro Small and Medium Enterprise Day worldwide and in perpetuity. The effort led by Professor Ayman El Tarabishy allowed graduate students an opportunity to attend and be involved with the event and participated in the event. These are opportunities only available at The George Washington University School of Business. We also developed and manage semi-annual working lunches with individuals, departments and various schools and colleges. These information-sharing events allow us to better coordinate and promote the numerous entrepreneurial activities at George Washington University.
University of Connecticut28. University of Connecticut
University of Connecticut
Peter J. Werth Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Storrs, Connecticut
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 17
Tuition: $17,186 (in-state); $39,098 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 38
What Sets Us Apart
We incorporate entrepreneurship into business, engineering, life sciences, law and education curriculum and provide extensive opportunities for students to engage with existing entrepreneurs and develop innovative business ideas. In addition to entrepreneurially named courses, the importance of entrepreneurial thinking appears in several project and strategy related courses taken by all business students. Similarly, many engineering courses offer content and opportunities to support entrepreneurial endeavors. Hands-on practical experience is provided along with extracurricular programs that support startups for all UConn graduate and undergraduate students all along the innovation and startup continuum. For example, a five-part mini-course, Innovation for Medical and Dental Clinical Professionals, guides graduate students at UConn Health toward entrepreneurial endeavors. The PIE program places students in bioscience labs for mentored summer research. Students and mentors participate in weekly seminars and workshops on innovation, entrepreneurship and technology. At UConn we believe that innovation cuts across all disciplines — it is not just technology. Further, developing innovation skills develops leadership and entrepreneurial skills. Each requires creativity, vision and honest examination of performance. Our many programs and course offerings help UConn develop tomorrow's leaders and entrepreneurs through instruction and practice in entrepreneurship.
29. Boston University
Boston University
Innovate@BU
Boston, MA
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 20
Tuition: $56,412
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 4
What Sets Us Apart
For graduate students, BU offers a variety of classes across the campus. The strength of our education comes from the 18 colleges that make up BU. This wide variety of subjects studied means we can embrace our belief that entrepreneurship applies to a wide variety of disciplines in a broad range of ways across our campus. Through this mission, we actively engage and inter-mix students from across the University in entrepreneurial classes and activities. Students can take classes in other colleges, and therefore, an engineering student can take a business class in order to help them launch their new venture. Classes such as the BU Law Clinic helps enrich the BU entrepreneurial ecosystem by providing startup law services to other BU students. Our extensive co-curricular programs are focused on experiential learning, and we also actively engage our alumnae in opportunities to share their wisdom and experiences with students, including special lectures, classroom appearances and the mentoring of student entrepreneurs. This connection with alumni is particularly welcomed by graduate students. In addition, we engage our students in entrepreneurially oriented educational opportunities outside of the University such as a for-credit program that embeds students in companies inside the MassChallenge digital health accelerator.
30. Clemson University
Clemson University
MBA in Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Greenville, South Carolina
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 22
Tuition: $19,166 (in-state); $35,672 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 32
What Sets Us Apart
Students coming into the Clemson MBAe program apply with a business idea in mind. From the first day of class, MBAe students are embraced by a professional advisory group of entrepreneurs and executive leaders who provide support, advice and feedback throughout the program. Courses are taught by a combination of seasoned entrepreneurs and experienced faculty known for research within the entrepreneurship discipline. All students are required to complete an internship with a successful entrepreneurial company, which includes an in-depth entrepreneurial narrative of the internship provider. All students participate in the EnterPrize Awards competition at the end of their program to compete for over $25,000 in startup cash prizes to help reach their goals. This is just one of several competitions available to students during their time at Clemson. We also provide incubator space to students who successfully graduated from the MBAe program; support includes office infrastructure and continued educational programming. In addition, we provide access to multiple incubator spaces across industry sectors.
31. Loyola Marymount University
Loyola Marymount University
Fred Kiesner Center for Entrepreneurship
Los Angeles, California
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 15
Tuition: $42,500
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 24
What Sets Us Apart
We work feverishly to help our students become successful entrepreneurs and fulfill our mission — to advance knowledge and develop business leaders with moral courage and creative confidence to be a force for good in the global community. The most important thing we do is instill the entrepreneurial spirit so students believe in their power and capabilities to solve problems. We dedicate ourselves to developing ethical leaders who demonstrate moral courage and create value in our world. Ethical citizenship encompasses corporate social responsibility, including economic, social and environmental responsibility. We develop a playground for the mind and a place to inspire the imagination promoting innovative solutions to business and societal challenges. Next, we embrace many disciplines and community connectedness to inform problems and address challenges in our world. We perceive ourselves as a community of interdependent teachers and learners as co-creators of knowledge, envisioning business as a force for good, best addressed with empathy, collaboration and an entrepreneurial mindset. Lastly, as an institution rooted in Jesuit & Marymount values, we take action to work as allies for social justice and aspire to develop all dimensions of the person — emotional, spiritual, physical and social.
32. Oklahoma State University
Oklahoma State University
Riata Center for Entrepreneurship
Stillwater, Oklahoma
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 18
Tuition: $6,492 (in-state); $18,118 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 29
What Sets Us Apart
Our classes provide a blend of experiential activities and classroom instruction. The CIE Scholar Class, for example, is based on the Customer Discovery Methodology, and the students in the class break into teams to assess the commercial potential of OSU technologies by interviewing potential customers and others. The effort has reaped tangible rewards, including startups that have gone on to raise several rounds of funding. The breadth of classes we offer is unique. Several courses are unique to our program, including "Launching a Business The First 100 Days," "Imagination" and "Designing, Prototyping and Testing Creative Products." We offer a master's degree, a Ph.D., and a Graduate Certificate. Our Ph.D. program is a signature program, and our graduates have received excellent placements in tenure-track positions. Our master's program is offered both on the Stillwater campus and online. We have received several national recognitions for the program. The School of Entrepreneurship applied for and was granted an NSF I-Corps Site, which is very active. A number of our graduate students have participated in the program. We maintain two student incubators, one in Stillwater and one in Tulsa. We offer an internship program and several entrepreneurship specific study abroad experiences. Sadly, our study abroad programs are on hold due to the worldwide pandemic, but we plan to restart them as soon as possible. In addition, our Entrepreneurship Club sponsors activities for students.
33. University of Oregon
University of Oregon
Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship
Eugene, Oregon
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 12
Tuition: $31,515 (in-state); $42,741 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 11
What Sets Us Apart
The Oregon MBA approach to graduate entrepreneurship is focused on maximizing student success with personalized support. Some students come to their MBA with an idea already developed and the motivation to launch. Others arrive with a general understanding of entrepreneurship and a desire to be a team member in a high growth company. A third archetype of student knows they want to strike out on their own someday, but feel like they need the tools of an MBA to maximize their chance of success. A personalized MBA requires a strong network of support that includes faculty, mentors from the community and alumni. We offer a one-to-one mentoring program for our students to connect with professionals. This program helps all our student find their own path into the workforce. Individual mentoring is augmented with advisory 'boards' that support our Venture Launch courses. These boards simulate the startup process with experienced leaders who guide startup decisions. For students with an idea, a passion and the drive to launch, this provides a support system that integrates with the Oregon ecosystem. Throughout the program, all our students meet regularly with both their MBA program managers and career advisors to identify the pathways forward that fits with their goals, life objectives and skillsets. By focusing on each student, entrepreneurship education at Oregon is about more than just launching companies. Our goal is seeing students thrive and engage in business to follow their passions.
34. University of San Francisco
University of San Francisco
Master of Science in Entrepreneurship and Innovation
San Francisco, California
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 24
Tuition: $40,150
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 11
What Sets Us Apart
We pride ourselves on our curriculum-guided and graduate credit-based, project-driven paid and unpaid internships in leading private and public Bay Area firms and social enterprises for one full semester. At least 30 percent of the students extend their internships for the second semester (two out of three full semesters of this one-year program) and STEM-certified curriculum.
35. American University
American University
American University Center for Innovation
Washington, D.C.
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 15
Tuition: $44,797
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 22
What Sets Us Apart
AUCI offers a wide variety of educational opportunities to all AU students. In 2017, AU began a partnership with FedTech.io to place students in a cohort of research and business professionals working to commercialize technologies developed by 25 different federal laboratories. AU was the first university allowed to place undergraduates in the program. The program continues with the AUCI.
Bloomberg | Getty Images36. University of Wisconsin-Madison
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Weinert Center for Entrepreneurship
Madison, Wisconsin
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 18
Tuition: $20,444 (in-state); $40,059 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 9
What Sets Us Apart
Students taking our entrepreneurship courses are from both inside and outside of the Wisconsin School of Business. Almost all of the courses include an experiential learning component where a student team applies the concepts learned in the class to real-world projects. Those projects may involve developing a new product rollout or financing plan for an existing firm or it might be the creation of a student or faculty lead startup. This provides students with the experience of building and working on cross-disciplinary teams in an entrepreneurial environment. One of our longest-running courses, Weinert Applied Ventures for Entrepreneurship (WAVE), provides student entrepreneurs with the opportunity to refine their ideas. The entrepreneurs then pitch their ideas to our advisory board and can receive a $50,000 to $100,000 investments from a fund tied to the course. These opportunities teach the skills that allow our alumni to become successful entrepreneurs and leaders in their careers. It is distinctive that we view entrepreneurship as a life/career skill and are organized to provide the academic and practice to students from across the entire UW campus. In 2020, UW-Madison and American Family Insurance joined with Creative Destruction Lab to launch one of the first sites in the U.S. and will provide an opportunity for students to work with high potential startups in the risk industry from across the globe.
37. University of Vermont
University of Vermont
Sustainable Innovation MBA
Burlington, Vermont
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 5
Tuition: $34,104 (in-state); $55,050 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 17
What Sets Us Apart
Student of The Sustainable Innovation MBA program benefit from an accelerated one-year program, designed to get our students back out there, inventing or reinventing their enterprise as soon as possible. They learn from and develop relationships with leaders from a master class of sustainable, entrepreneurial enterprises, including Ben & Jerry's, Burton Snowboards, Keurig Green Mountain and Seventh Generation. Students can do meaningful, high-impact work with global partners who have on-the-ground access in emerging markets and the developing world. For example, students in prior years have spent the summer practicum experiences working on sustainable innovation initiatives with companies like PepsiCo and Novelis in Latin American and Asian countries. Students also interact with some of the leading thinkers and doers in the field of sustainable enterprise, both here in Vermont and from around the world through our Innovator in Residence Program. Finally, we've designed a unique curriculum delivered by faculty from our School of Business along with colleagues from the Department of Community Development and Applied Economics, nationally ranked Rubenstein School of Natural Resources as well as the Gund Institute for the Environment and Vermont Law School.
38. Erasmus University Rotterdam
Erasmus University Rotterdam
Erasmus Centre for Entrepreneurship
Rotterdam, Netherlands
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 20
Tuition: $58,276
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 103
What Sets Us Apart
We believe our Strategic Entrepreneurship MSc program is built on three important elements: diversity, networking and integration. We have a diverse faculty with their own take on entrepreneurship and different experiences, teaching a variety of topics with different methods (from case study to out-of-the-building practice). We also have a great network of practitioners, entrepreneurs/investors and incubators/accelerators. Such a diverse network allows students to benefit from an array of experiences, and we try to integrate such diversity at various levels for the student's sake.
DenisTangneyJr | Getty Images39. University of Florida
University of Florida
Entrepreneurship & Innovation Center
Gainesville, Florida
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 23
Tuition: $13,750 (in-state); $31,150 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: NR
University of Massachusetts Amherst | Facebook40. University of Massachusetts Amherst
University of Massachusetts Amherst
Berthiaume Center for Entrepreneurship
Amherst, Massachusetts
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 6
Tuition: $16,916 (in-state); $36,725 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: NR
What Sets Us Apart
We place a strong emphasis on interdisciplinary teams and action, rather than simply talking about ideas. Our cross-disciplinary education is fully immersed in experiential learning and focuses on following through and creating ventures.
41. Florida Atlantic University
Florida Atlantic University
Adams Center for Entrepreneurship
Boca Raton, Florida
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 12
Tuition: $6,657 (in-state); $17,885 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 29
What Sets Us Apart
Our distinctive approach to entrepreneurship education consists of initial primary research (FAU Wave program), a dozen entrepreneurship courses and educational and financial resources and support provided by the Adams Center for Entrepreneurship. The center provides a boot camp, professional mentorship, global entrepreneurship week activities, networking organizations, pitch competition, veterans' entrepreneurship program, business plan competition and support for numerous external competitions. Our graduates grow their ventures through FAU's accelerator, Tech Runway, and receive full operational support from FAU Research Park. In combination, these university-wide programs provide comprehensive support to all undergraduate entrepreneurs at FAU, whether they are in business, engineering, computer science, the honors college, physical science, liberal arts, education or other programs.
Tulane University42. Tulane University
Tulane University
Albert Lepage Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
New Orleans, Louisiana
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 12
Tuition: $57,708
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 6
What Sets Us Apart
New Orleans, which has emerged as an entrepreneurial hub in recent years, provides a compelling backdrop to this course of study. Students pursuing the entrepreneurship concentration can focus on early-stage venture creation (founding a company), second-stage growth (working with early-stage companies) and venture finance. Courses provide practical, applicable knowledge about strategy, management and operations in fast-growing start-ups. Opportunities for independent study allow students to focus on a particular business segment or industry. As one of the fastest-growing business schools in the country, the Freeman School experienced increased demand for entrepreneurship courses and guidance in starting and growing businesses. In 2018, the business school completed an expansion featuring 80,000 square feet of new and renovated space, creating opportunities for additional classrooms, an incubator space and other facilities that would support education in entrepreneurship and innovation.
State University of New York at Stony Brook43. State University of New York at Stony Brook
State University of New York at Stony Brook
Innovation Center and Entrepreneurial Finance Center
Stony Brook, New York
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 6
Tuition: $28,000 (in-state); $30,200 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 5
44. Eastern Michigan University
Eastern Michigan University
Center for Entrepreneurship
Ypsilanti, Michigan
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 6
Tuition: $15,260 (in-state); $26,850 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 10
What Sets Us Apart
Our approach to graduate entrepreneurship is very applied, exposing students to contemporary research in entrepreneurship. Our approach is inter-disciplinary and we encourage students from across campus to take our graduate entrepreneurship courses which emphasize a culture of entrepreneurship in the EMU community by supporting a strong entrepreneurship curriculum and offering a variety of co-curricular programs.
University of San Diego45. University of San Diego
University of San Diego
Entrepreneurship & Innovation Catalyzer
San Diego, California
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 13
Tuition: $43,000
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: NR
What Sets Us Apart
As a highly ranked professional business school in a private Catholic University designated as a changemaker campus, our programming allows us to mold our students into ethical entrepreneurial leaders, with a strong foundation in the core values of catholic social justice. Our graduate education focuses on keeping the concept of "business for good" front-and-center, regardless of the products and services our students come up with. While students address a social innovation through the Global Social Innovation Challenge and related courses, we also provide opportunities for our students to create socially responsible businesses, even if they do not focus on a social problem but instead on producing products and services that maximize value for all stakeholders. At the business school, we also reiterate our University's Vision 2024, which includes pathways of access and inclusion, care for our common home, anchor institution and practicing changemaking. This positioning differentiates us from other competing regional schools and also positions us as one of the key players in entrepreneurship in San Diego for creating ethical entrepreneurial leaders. Our vision is to expand our outreach to all of southern California.
46. Wright State University
Wright State University
New Venture Creation
Dayton, Ohio
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 3
Tuition: $14,840 (in-state); $24,828 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: Not reported
What Sets Us Apart
We pride ourselves on experiential learning and interacting with real business people, situations and planning for actionable new ventures.
47. Concordia University
Concordia University
John Molson School of Business
Montreal, Quebec
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 7
Tuition: $24,725
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: NR
48. University of Alabama at Birmingham
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Bill L. Harbert Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Birmingham, Alabama
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 6
Tuition: $8,000 (in-state); $19,000 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 6
What Sets Us Apart
Our endowed chair is the professor in residence at Innovation Depot, the largest co-working space/incubator in the southeastern U.S., with more than 100 entrepreneurial ventures housed there. In addition, we are an official I-Corps site.
49. Xavier University
Xavier University
Xavier Center for Innovation
Cincinnati, Ohio
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 20
Tuition: $15,500
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: 1
What Sets Us Apart
Our program is focused on having students work from idea generation to business plan development to business launch. We involve guest speakers and trips for our students to visit local entrepreneurial ventures, incubators and accelerators.
50. Oregon State University
Oregon State University
InnovationX, the OSU Center of Excellence for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Corvallis, Oregon
Number of Entrepreneurship Courses Offered: 4
Tuition: $20,221 (in-state); $34,882 (out-of-state)
Companies Started by Graduates Over the Last 5 Years: NR
What Sets Us Apart
Graduates of the MBA in Innovation Management will be able to develop a research-driven, investor-ready, lean-canvas business model and plan to take an innovative idea to market. They'll learn to present a compelling argument for funding and complete a self-paced project based on development/analysis of an innovative business or concept. Topics come from a variety of places, including OSU research faculty, regional startups, early-phase companies and corporate partners. A project sponsor provides background and advice over the duration of the project, and students can provide their own ideas while participate in the four-week iterate program through the OSU Advantage Accelerator.
