Entrepreneurship at ORU
Equipping students to launch successful businesses of their own.
Oral Roberts University’s College of Business is offering a new degree program called “business administration in entrepreneurship,” which is designed to equip students to launch successful businesses of their own.
The curriculum integrates a biblical worldview with an emphasis on social entrepreneurship and business as mission, officials said.
“The way the curriculum is structured, students will have to start a business by senior year,” said Bill Crawford, chairman of the Undergraduate Business Department. “If we are a Spirit-empowered student body, then we have an opportunity to start a business and influence the market.”
The college also offers an entrepreneurship minor, “which is cool,” Crawford said, “because students can gain those skills no matter what their major is.”
A $1 million donation to start the entrepreneurship program came from best-selling author and television executive Jim Stovall, a 1981 ORU graduate. The gift also led to the creation of the Stovall Center for Entrepreneurship on campus.
The major currently has 38 students enrolled, officials said.
Program Director Kevin Schneider expects students to change their thinking from “the employee mindset” to “a business-owner mindset.”
Students will “develop creative capacity, learn and apply lean startup methods, develop a business plan and personally launch their own business,” he said. “Students are trained to build a company, not just create a job for themselves.”
The very first intro class that students take is Spirit of Entrepreneurship, in which students immediately launch their own “side hustles” to begin earning income.
Outside of entrepreneurship classes, the Stovall Center provides networking, workshops and mentoring through The Launch, a competition that allows students to pitch business ideas to real-life investors.
Student can follow the entrepreneurship program on Instagram @orustovallcenter or Facebook @Stovall Center for Entrepreneurship. Or student can visit the program’s webpage at oru.edu/sc4e.
