Proceedings of the 2015 International Conference on Cultivating Undergraduate Entrepreneurship and Management Engineering

Entrepreneurship is, perhaps, the single topic that is receiving most attention across universities in China. The Chinese government, at all levels, has recognised the importance of micro and small to medium-size enterprises in creating economic growth and providing employment. As with governments in other developed and developing economies, they see the development of entrepreneurship in young people as a way to stimulate the economy and meet the challenges of finding suitable employment for young graduates.

To respond to this government direction, Chinese universities are facing the challenge of developing and delivering courses appropriate for undergraduate entrepreneurs and implementing infrastructures and support to help students with their own start-ups.

This activity puts tremendous pressure on faculty. As entrepreneurship is a relatively recent academic discipline, there is a major shortage of faculty with relevant experience, whether in research or teaching. The International Conference in Cultivating Undergraduate Entrepreneurship and Management Engineering (CUEME 2015) is an early effort to help faculty gain knowledge and skills and share with one another their experiences. The conference, held in Chongqing in June 2015, brought together some 150 university leaders and faculty to participate in plenary sessions, workshops and other activities.

As part of the conference, researchers were invited to submit papers on any aspect of entrepreneurship education. All papers submitted were reviewed and, for those accepted by the conference, they then went through a revision cycle before publication in these proceedings.

Thus, in these proceedings you will find some interesting early efforts to examine the undergraduate student population and their readiness for entrepreneurship activities, suggestions for curriculum content and how to teach entrepreneurship in an innovative manner. In addition, some case studies present the results of outside the classroom activities. From this work readers can see that entrepreneurial education and practice is alive and well and evolving inside Chinese universities. For many of the authors, this may have been their first paper in English on the topic and they are to be commended for their efforts. Some authors were unable to attend the conference and present their papers. These papers have been annotated to show this.

Kenneth A. Grant
Ryerson University, Toronto
Conference Chair and Proceedings Editor