WINSTON-SALEM–An Entrepreneur Magazine survey has ranked the Angell Center for Entrepreneurship at Wake Forest University’s Babcock Graduate School of Management as number 9 nationally.
Tshe magazine’s second annual survey of entrepreneurship progrms also recognizes Stan Mandel, founder and director of the Angell Center, as third. The magazine surveys program directors, faculty and alumni nationally to establish its rankings.
The results of the survey appear in the May 2004 issue of the magazine.
“The continued and consistent recognition of entrepreneurship within Wake Forest’s MBA program is attributable to the contributions of students, faculty and staff,” Mandel said. “Student participation in entrepreneurial activity continues to drive our success. These are exciting times to begin careers that encompass entrepreneurial activity, whether you start your own business, launch new ventures within existing companies or provide services to such organizations. We’re looking forward to new challenges of institutionalizing entrepreneurship across the entire Wake Forest campus as participants in the Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership’s grant program.”
Done by TechKnowledge Point Corp., an entrepreneurship and business development research firm, the study includes data on more than 1,000 entrepreneurship programs. TechKnowledge Point Corp. identifies and ranks 100 entrepreneurial programs. Fifty of the schools have comprehensive entrepreneurship programs at nationally prominent universities. The remaining 50 programs are ranked at the regional level. Wake Forest’s Angell Center is listed in the national programs.
The Angell Center for Entrepreneurship features several programs to foster entrepreneurship, including the Babcock Demon Incubator, the Family Business Center (Triad and Charlotte) and nationally renowned MBA student competitions including the Kauffman/Angell Center National Entrepreneurial Case-Writing Competition and the Babcock Elevator Competition.
The Babcock Demon Incubator, opened in 2001, offers office space and Internet access for growing businesses. It houses three to five start-up businesses, with tenants admitted on a rolling basis throughout the year having the option of 12 months to grow and find a permanent location. The goal for the incubator is to launch businesses that have the potential to create economic impact in the Triad through jobs and business investment.
The Family Business Center was established in 1999 and expanded in 2003 to include a site in Charlotte. Each year, the center holds six or more programs that help members create stronger families and businesses.
The Kauffman/Angell Center National Entrepreneurial Case-Writing Competition features students who present original teaching case studies with teaching notes based on their internships in one of two areas: traditional entrepreneurship and social entrepreneurship. The competition helps students bridge the gap between theory and practice by examining their internship experiences in depth. The case studies can be used in MBA classrooms to teach entrepreneurial concepts.
In the Babcock Elevator Competition, MBA students from the nation’s top universities compete to transform a two-minute elevator trip at the Wachovia Center in downtown Winston-Salem into the ride of a lifetime. Approximately 30 teams of students have the duration of two, two-minute elevator rides to sell a venture capitalist on their business idea. The winning team enters discussions with one or more venture capital firms.
The Angell Center for Entrepreneurship was started in 1999 primarily from an endowment funded by Winston-Salem area entrepreneur Don Angell and his family.
Wake Forest MBA Program
www.mba.wfu.edu
