US West

Center for Entrepreneurial Studies

College of Business

Washington State University

PO Box 644743

Pullman, WA USA 99164-4743

Phone: 509-335-5051

There is perhaps nothing more important that a university like WSU can do than to educate tomorrow's global, entrepreneurial leaders. This is vital not only to our state's economic future but to the economic future of the United States and of all other nations as well. Fortunately, we live in a state with a rich and vibrant entrepreneurial history, as witnessed by the success of firms such as Microsoft and Boeing Commercial Airlines, two very successful companies that were either co-founded and/or are currently run by Cougar alumni. Similarly, WSU has a rich and vibrant history of attracting students with an entrepreneurial bent and providing them with the teaching and related experiences they need to succeed, as evidenced by the successful alums now spread across the business world either in executive leadership positions and/or as founders of successful firms.

Established in 1995, the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies within the College of Business at Washington State University has played a major role in preparing these entrepreneurial leaders for success. Our mission is to enable students, business leaders, managers of governmental agencies, scientists, policy makers, and others, through our teaching and our research, to better capitalize on their ideas, inventions, and innovations. We are as much about helping with new ventures as we are preparing entrepreneurial leaders within existing organizations, particularly given the concern nationally that corporations are not managing innovation successfully and the implications that has for the national and global economy. We are a nationally recognized program by entities such as Entrepreneur Magazine and our vision is to be among the best entrepreneurship programs in the country, ever expanding our quality, performance, impact, and reach, so that we might help even more people to successfully capitalize on their ideas.

There is a quote attributed to Sir Isaac Newton that reads, "If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants." Indeed, with the founding of our program by then-Dean Rom Markin, and with the excellent stewardship of our program in recent years by Dr. Jerman Rose, they have provided the foundation on which we have accomplished a great deal together over the past year and a half as we have worked together to take the program to the next level. For example, in just a short time we have:

·        Grown our team by hiring new, full-time, staff members and faculty, effectively tripling our program FTE 

·        Moved the team into a new suite on the 4th floor of Todd Hall

·        Formed a new, outstanding advisory board and have it up and running and adding value to our programs

·        Ramped up our Cougar Entrepreneurs Club and Students in Free Enterprise club

·        Brought in record-breaking amounts of new private funding such that the program is now backed by three, sizeable endowments, plus a sizeable amount of annual private funding

      Â·        Implemented online versions of our undergraduate major and minor, bringing additional revenue to our program and expand our reach globally

·        Have many student teams launching real, new businesses

·        Added new events and activities such as the Entrepreneurship Panel Discussion and start-up tours in Seattle for our students

·        Launched several new, heavy-hitting research projects in the areas of technology transfer and commercialization

·        Deliver critical, required components of both the College’s full-time MBA program as well as the Executive MBA

·        Grown our annual Business Plan Competition to include 45 teams, 42 external judges, and over $100,000 in prize money

·        Ranked as the 18^th undergraduate program in the nation in 2008 by Entrepreneur magazine and the Princeton Review

We are a program on the move and one with an important role to play within our university, our state, and beyond. We welcome you to join us either as a student, as a volunteer, or in some other way as a member of our team.

Go Cougs!