Foundational Courses
Pick one of the following for the ENT Minor
Instructor for Sections 1 and 2: Tina Weber, Lecturer
Instructor for Section 3: Elaine Chen, Director, Derby Entrepreneurship Center; Cummings Family Professor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
There is no better way to understand how to create, plan and run a business than to learn how to start one. In this course we will introduce the core mindset and skillset behind new venture creation. Students will learn how to systematically explore their own passions and desire for impact to find problems worth solving, team up with other students with similar industry or sector interests, and learn how to build a new, standalone venture by building and pitching one during the semester. Students will learn tools and frameworks from practicing entrepreneurs. The mindset and skillset you will learn will form a strong foundation for you to further explore additional topics in innovation, entrepreneurship, and leadership.
Upon completion of the course, students will have learned to speak the language of business and understand the process of starting a new venture. Specifically, they will:
- Adopt an entrepreneurial mindset, including the ability to be nimble, agile, iterative, willing to take risks and learn from failure
- Understand the basic principles behind innovation and new venture creation, including but not limited to:
- Exploring their personal sense of purpose while finding and addressing problems worth solving
- Analyzing market opportunities and selecting attractive market targets
- Understanding the market, customer, key stakeholders, and what is required to create a solution that is better than current alternatives
- Developing a go-to-market strategy, including an effective marketing plan and viable business model
- Building a financially sustainable venture that is either bootstrappable and/or fundable
- Learning how to build and contribute to a high performing team, and the logistics around building a company
- Developing effective pitching and presentation skills
Preview draft syllabus here. (Subject to change)
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing
Note: This course is required for the Entrepreneurship minor.
Instructor: Josh Wiesman, Professor of the Practice
When: Fall
Description:
This course covers the entrepreneurial process from conception to commercialization or launch of a new venture focused on a consumer product. It looks at both process and people involved in assessing ideas, exploiting opportunities, gathering resources, and converting concepts into financially and technically viable businesses. We will pay particular attention to the ways in which students can apply their different skill sets and abilities to enter and succeed in business. The course seeks to help students think through the career path that makes the most sense for them given their particular backgrounds and aspirations in both an entrepreneurial or corporate environments.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing.
Additional notes: This course may be taken in lieu of ENT101 for the ENT Minor.
Additional Entrepreneurship Courses
Exploratory courses
When: Fall and spring
Description:
This class is designed for undergraduate students, particularly Freshmen and Sophomores, who have not taken an ENT core course and are interested in learning more about innovation and entrepreneurship. Focusing on tools and techniques to promote creativity and innovation, you will develop capabilities that can be applied to everyday problem solving, launching new ventures, and working in businesses and non-profit organizations. We will engage in rapid ideation workshops where you will repeatedly challenge your brain to come up with novel solutions and innovations. You will be exposed to a variety of tools to help stimulate brainstorming and creativity. During the semester, we will study different types of innovation and use “design thinking” to address a series of real-world problems with creative solutions.
Restrictions on Enrollment: All are welcome (especially first-year undergraduate students). We accept any undergraduate or graduate student with no significant design thinking, innovation or entrepreneurship experience to take this class
Instructor: Mac Cameron, Entrepreneur & Lecturer @ MIT
Co-Instructor: Elaine Chen, Director, DEC; Cummings Family Professor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship
When: Fall
Description:
"Introduction to Making" (15.351) is a highly immersive, hands-on introductory course for undergraduate and graduate students in any course of study. If you are curious about how to make physical things, make them work and integrate them with electronics/software, you've come to the right place. You will gain knowledge of common fabrication techniques - foamboard, 3D printing, laser cutting, electronics, Arduino programming and more. You will then use this knowledge/skill while working on an individual final project that leads up to the "Demo Day."
Restrictions on Enrollment: All are welcome (especially first-year undergraduate students). No experience necessary!
Co-Instructor: Philip Ellison, A16, Founder & Consultant
Co-Instructor: Alex Ocampo, A14, Founder & Startup Operator
When: Fall, Second Half (October 31 to December 12, 7 meetings)
Description:
There is not one path to entrepreneurship. In this course, students learn and unlearn what it means to be an entrepreneur and the various paths one can take towards entrepreneurship. Whether starting in a traditional corporate job, joining a startup, creating content as influencer on social media platforms, working on a social problem, or monetizing your side hustle, students will learn from experts in the field how to leverage their experiences at Tufts and beyond to progress towards their ultimate goals. Students will engage in discussions and workshops to understand their narrative and envision their entrepreneurial future.
Restrictions on Enrollment: No restrictions on enrollment: Undergraduate & graduate students welcome. Limited seats available to first-year undergrads.
Core courses (At least 6 credits from this list is required for the ENT Minor)
Instructor for Section 1: Frank Apeseche, Professor of the Practice
Instructor for Section 2: Andy O'Brien, Lecturer
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
This course focuses on developing and applying the financial skills that are needed to successfully manage commercial and social enterprises. Students will learn how to construct a financial business plan for a startup, analyze and contrast the financial statements of existing companies, and evaluate business opportunities to optimize financial outcomes and avoid financial peril. Students will also learn about the different forms of company financing and how professional investors and lenders evaluate companies. By the end of the course students will understand how to financially position a company to maximize its potential of raising appropriate capital. The course is taught through a variety of readings, problem sets, case studies and team exercises. It is hands-on.
This course has a rigorous workload. This includes the numerous problem sets and Harvard Business School cases previously mentioned, as well as a capstone term project where each student will create a fully vetted financial plan for a startup or existing company. After taking the course students will gain a mastery of how to:
- analyze the financial statements of a company
- build pro forma financial statements for new product (or service) initiatives, department budgets within a company, or a simple business
- quantify and apply core financial return concepts such as net present value, internal rate of return, multiple on investment, payback, ROI, leveraged versus unleveraged return, dilution, and break-even analysis to vital business applications
- apply the financial principles to evaluate a new product or business idea, and its impact on the financial health and performance of the business
- complete a simple valuation of a business and construct its enterprise value, market value of equity, post-money value and pre-money value
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing. Recommended prerequisite: ENT 101
Note:
- This course is required for the Entrepreneurship minor.
- It's recommended that students complete an accounting elective prior to this course.
Instructor for Section 1: Jack Derby, Professor of the Practice
Instructor for Section 2: Gavin Finn, Ph.D., Professor of the Practice
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
This course focuses on institutional and product marketing methods used by start-up to medium-sized companies. After an overview of basic marketing principles, the course will cover the spectrum from day-to-day marketing activities of the entrepreneurial business to positioning and strategy. Students will learn to analyze, formulate, and implement marketing strategies, explore concepts for understanding customer behavior and creating an entrepreneurial marketing strategy, and learn the fundamentals of market research, pricing, and reaching and selling to customers.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing. Recommended prerequisite: ENT 101
Note: This course is required for the Entrepreneurship minor.
Instructor for Sections 1 and 2: Beth McCarthy, Lecturer
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
This course is designed to help students develop the knowledge, confidence, skills, and self-image necessary to pursue entrepreneurial ventures in such domains as business, government, and public service. It provides a foundation in the fundamentals of entrepreneurial leadership, as well as a source of inspiration and energy in the art and science of taking visions and bringing them to reality.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing. Recommended Prerequisite: ENT 101
Skills deep dive
Instructor: Joe Volman, Lecturer
When: Fall
Description:
Entrepreneurial Business Law is an interactive class featuring speakers from the private equity, venture capital, and investment banking worlds as well as executives who have exited through a public offering or sale of their company. We will explore legal issues and considerations that are common to businesses as they are formed and throughout their business life cycle. The course will focus on several aspects relating to formation and seed and venture capital financing, mergers and acquisitions, initial public offerings and securities laws considerations, as well as employment and intellectual property matters and governance considerations. There will also be opportunities to negotiate various financing and other transactions.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Must have at least Sophomore standing
Sector Focus
Instructor: Ron Lasser, Professor of the Practice, EECS
When: Fall
Description:
Multi-disciplinary perspective of innovative technology-based design process for societal and community influence. Elements and principles of design from product development process, thought and emotion, ethics and responsibility. Experiments to explore failure and iteration, reflection for self-discovery and innovation. Articulation and expression via written, oral and pre-recorded audio and video presentations showing measurable impact of solutions as societal benefits.
This is an elective for SMFA, A&S, and SOE as ENT109 or EE193-4
Restrictions on Enrollment: None.
Notes: Cross-listed as EE193.4
When: Fall
Description:
Nonprofits are a valued engine for community engagement and innovation across the country. They play a highly visible and essential role meeting community needs, and they serve as laboratories for experimental, innovative strategies supporting individual opportunity, expression, and community equity objectives. This increasingly complex sector is built on the desire to do good through scalable, sustainable organizational strategies that deliver impact.
You will learn about what it takes to be a successful nonprofit: vision, resources, leadership, and execution. Through case analysis, press analysis, group discussions, and interactions with nonprofit leaders, you will learn how entrepreneurship and philanthropy are deeply intertwined in healthy, high-performing organizations. You will also develop the skills to assess the connection between nonprofits, social change and justice through direct conversation with grant makers and nonprofit leaders, and will devise a grantmaking strategy awarding $25,000 in grant funding to local nonprofits through support from former Tufts trustee Nathan Gantcher.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Sophomore status. Freshman admitted by faculty consent.
Note: Taught in partnership with Tisch College Preview syllabusImmersive Experiences
Approver: Elaine Chen, Director, TEC; Cummings Family Professor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
The Entrepreneurial internship allows students to earn credit while working as an intern for their company sponsor during the semester. Under the guidance of a faculty member serving as an entrepreneurial advisor, students have a chance to apply concepts learned in the classroom and acquire new skills as they address real life challenges.
In this course, the student assumes an employee role in the company. Internships typically involve students serving in a functional role with an entrepreneurial focus, such as product management, entrepreneurial marketing and sales.
Approver: Elaine Chen, Director, TEC; Cummings Family Professor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship
When: Fall and Spring
Location: On-Campus
Description: Classroom Operating Officers, known as COO’s receive course credit for providing leadership and student support for Entrepreneurship courses. By taking Inside the Classroom, you will assist in coaching peers, organizing course work, attendance tracking, and observing group work.
Enrollment process: Entrepreneurship faculty or staff typically reach out to gauge interest and availability to select students for upcoming semesters. If the student’s schedule can accommodate the course and the student is interested, the faculty member will meet with them to discuss expectations. Upon mutual interest, we will provide permission for the student to enroll in this course in SIS.
Restrictions on Enrollment: Registration requires department consent
Pre-requisite: With the exception of new or substantially redesigned courses, having taken the course you are proposing to support and earned an "A" grade is a prerequisite. Additionally, permission/invitation by faculty is required. Limit 2 students per ENT class.
Faculty expectations:
- COO Selection should be made prior to the start of the semester, ideally by the end of the previous semester
- The opportunity should be announced in class and Canvas site to encourage multiple candidates
- The student should have successfully completed the course prior to accepting the role of COO
- Faculty should email name and Tufts ID number for the COO’s to carol.denning@tufts.edu to provide special permission in SIS for the student to register for ENT194.04 Special Topics- Inside the Classroom
- The selected COO’s should be added to Canvas as assistants and announced to the class with a description of the role and responsibilities
- The COO grade should be determined by the quality of fulfillment of the COO expectations
COO Expectations:
- COO must register for ENT194.04 Inside the Classroom at least 2 weeks prior to the start of semester
- COO must submit work plan with agreed upon objectives within 2 weeks of start of semester
- COO must submit 1-page formal reflections halfway through the semester. The reflections should cover what went well, what could have gone better, and how might the COO help the course improve its operations in the second half of the semester.
- COO must submit 1-page formal reflections at the end of the semester, highlighting what the COO gained from the experience along with recommendations
- Time commitment is 6-9 hours a week, inclusive of class time
- Assist with course prep and provide input on syllabus
- Act in an advisory capacity to students and respond to student inquiries in a timely manner
- Provide guidance and motivation to students and communicate expectations on projects and assignments
- Review papers and projects, provide feedback, lead discussions, and participate in assessments; faculty is responsible for assignining grades
- Negotiate and resolve conflicts
- Support faculty to create a quality learning experience for students
This course will be graded (see Syllabus for rubric, restrictions and enrollment process).
Approver: Elaine Chen, Director, TEC; Cummings Family Professor of the Practice in Entrepreneurship
When: Fall and Spring
Description:
This immersive course enables students to apply the learning and skills acquired by other courses on Entrepreneurship to the creation and development of their own new venture. Under the guidance of a faculty member serving as an entrepreneurial advisor, students have a chance to apply concepts learned in the classroom and acquire new skills as they address real life challenges.
In this course, the student assumes a co-founder role in the venture. The student will operate with the mindset of a business owner (responsible for overall strategy and operations for all aspects of the venture), not a functional leader (responsible for one department such as marketing, sales, engineering or the like).
The new venture that the student is building can be for-profit, not-for-profit or in the context of a government agency or university or association.