In an earlier post I explained that the theory of academic capitalism enables me to analyze what Yale as a modern research university is doing to integrate with the 21^st century knowledge economy. The theory of academic capitalism captures the many ways, methods, processes and means through which market and market-like behaviors, as well as a market ethos and ideology have been incorporated in postsecondary education, thus blurring the boundaries between markets and higher education. In my view, the infrastructure associated with academic capitalism enables Yale to monetize the value of the new knowledge created by faculty and students. And it empowers students to innovate for the new economy, and if they chose, create their own jobs and control the intellectual property and the intellectual capital.

Academic capitalism raises the question: What is the proper alignment of a university’s mission? Essentially, this methodology leads to the conclusion that entrepreneurship and commercialization are part of a new corporate logic, traditionally foreign to the academy, which is affecting and for some infecting the ways in which academic institutions are run (Duranti 2013). Whatever the contra-arguments are, the trend is clear: there is an inexorable convergence of the academy, markets and market-like behaviors.

This week the Yale School of Management (“SOM”) announced that it is expanding and modernizing entrepreneurship programming.

The announcement of the new Entrepreneurship Program coincides with the appointment of Dr. Kyle Jensen as the inaugural Shanna and Eric Bass ’05 Director of Entrepreneurial Programs. Jensen will design and teach courses in entrepreneurship. He will recruit and advise student entrepreneurs, establish programming that complements the work of the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute and other university resources, strengthen connections with SOM alumni entrepreneurs and entrepreneurially minded constituents across Yale.

This is significant because the SOM piece is perhaps the last major piece of the student-orientated infrastructure that Yale needs to credibly establish itself as a major player in university-based student-led innovation, technology and entrepreneurship. At Yale’s peers, such as Stanford and Harvard, the B-School drives the innovation and entrepreneurship agenda. Yale’s efforts seem to be coalescing around an ethos of collaboration across the university, sharing agenda making and being thoughtful about how the university’s resources are being deployed in the best interest of all its students: undergraduate, graduate and professional students. Yale, from a peer-group perspective, can maintain a competitive position to recruit students and faculty who are interested in innovation, technology and entrepreneurship.

All of the major pieces of the infrastructure are in place: entrepreneurship pedagogy – SOM, academic maker space – the Center for Engineering, Innovation and Design (“CEID”), venture creation – the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute, and social entrepreneurship – InnovateHealth Yale. The next phase of the build-out entails fostering a culture of commercialization: patterns of behavior that lead to a dominant attitude of deliberate or conscious entrepreneurship as opposed to serendipitous or happenstance entrepreneurship. The notion is that students would consciously set out to create viable, scalable and sustainable ventures.

Along these lines CEID, has expanded its Summer Fellowship program to include graduate students.  This is meaningful because there is a higher likelihood that graduate students start a project with commercializing of their efforts in mind.

The pattern that is emerging at Yale encapsulates an environment that provides resources and facilities wherein students can engage their curiosity in the realm of experiential learning to solve real world problems. “In a sense, science and technology are nudging humanity toward the old path of learning by interacting with things rather than with abstractions,” stated science writer Timothy Ferris. He continues, “Science may be new, but scientific experimentation is essentially a refinement of the preliterate practice of interrogating nature directly — of trying things out, getting your hands dirty, and discarding what doesn’t actually work.”

Students, alumni and university patrons seem to be demanding an experiential problem based approach to critical thinking, effective problem-solving and enhanced communication skills. Arguably these skills will give students another framework to identify and evaluate new markets and new opportunities within existing markets.