In Texas, the Hankamer School of Business, Baylor University is one of the few that offers a Doctorate (PhD) in Entrepreneurship. Recognizing that entrepreneurship research is a fast-growing field, the program “covers the theory, history, impact, and practice of entrepreneurship as it prepares students for successful careers as researchers and teachers.”
Looking at the profiles of faculty and students, the research areas for a PhD in entrepreneurship at Baylor University seem to be:
- Entrepreneurial behavior
- Entrepreneurial well-being
- Innovation and Entrepreneurship
- Entrepreneurial action
- Opportunity recognition
The Department’s view on practitioners in the context of an entrepreneurship PhD is interesting:
The Baylor PhD aims to equip you with skills to become a leader in the academic field of entrepreneurship. (Note that while practitioner experience is welcome, it is not required; we are training entrepreneurship scholars, not practitioners.)
Moreover, the program stresses the importance of teaching skills by requiring doctoral students to take courses and undergo apprenticeships “to develop an understanding of curricular issues, course development and content, teaching techniques, and learning theories”. Graduates from the PhD program in entrepreneurship at Baylor are trained for careers as analysts and policy-makers – besides researchers and teachers.
The teaching component for doctoral candidates includes:
- Coursework on Teaching and Learning in Higher Education,
- A teaching apprenticeship during the second year of the PhD program, and
- Promotion to ‘professor of record’ for one course per semester.