IIM-A faculty to teach entrepreneurship at Ashoka University

Ashoka University, India’s first non-profit liberal arts university and Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA), one of the top management institutes globally have joined hands to design an entrepreneurship curriculum to be delivered at Ashoka University.

IIMA’s Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) and the Ashoka University’s Centre for Entrepreneurship (CfE) will work closely to design and teach the minor in entrepreneurship to undergraduate students at Ashoka. The tie-up emphasizes on the relevance of the merger of liberal arts and management studies to create leaders and change makers.

“We are delighted to collaborate with IIMA for this minor in entrepreneurship. We are positive that this will be a holistic experience for liberal arts students who envision themselves as entrepreneurs,” said Sanjeev Bikhchandani, Founder, Ashoka University and an alumnus of IIMA.

Eminent Faculty members from IIMA such as Ankur Sarin, and Mukesh Sud will deliver lectures at Ashoka University as a part of the programme. Amit Karna, Chairperson CIIE, commented, “We believe that formal education of entrepreneurship can make a huge difference in the way entrepreneurial ventures are created and run. Students from non-management or non-technical background can learn as much from it.”

Priyank Narayan, Director, Centre for Entrepreneurship (CfE) at Ashoka University says, “Students at Ashoka will be exposed to different themes of entrepreneurship as a part of the programme. This partnership will bring to the forefront the inter-disciplinary nature of entrepreneurship. There will be a focus on segments like cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit, creative problem solving, social entrepreneurship, design thinking and new venture planning.” The minor in Entrepreneurship would require a student to study 6 courses in Entrepreneurship over 3 years.

This programme would be the first of its kind as the visiting faculty members have a close connect with liberal studies and the public policy space. Mukesh Sud, Associate Professor in the Business Policy Area at IIMA, has earlier taught entrepreneurship at a US liberal arts college for 10 years. Ankur Sarin, an Assistant Professor at IIMA, teaches courses in Social Entrepreneurship and Public Policy.