Opinion: Universities face a financial crisis. The key to survival is the scholar-entrepreneur
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A Stanford University student walks in front of Hoover Tower in Palo Alto, Calif., in February, 2012.Paul Sakuma/The Associated Press
Peter Zhang is a doctoral candidate at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Toronto.
In Canada and the United States, restrictions on the entry of international students have put further pressure on higher-education funding. Most institutions rely on a mix of government support, tuition fees and philanthropy, all of which are being squeezed.
To get by, universities should invest more in the development of scholar-entrepreneurs – students or faculty who offer additional sources of funding by commercializing their work.
For example, Stanford University generated more than $1.3-billion in cumulative gross royalties between 1970 and 2010 from licensing its research and technology.
What if institutions provided active support for startups founded by scholar-entrepreneurs in exchange for a stake in the enterprise?
This model of revenue sharing exists in many institutions and can carry significant upsides. However, there are still gaps in how entrepreneurship education is delivered.
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Outside of business schools, students and faculty are generally not exposed to such an education. Support may come in the form of incubators, expert advice and industry contacts, but these programs need to be sought out and are designed to develop ideas that are already ripe for commercialization. This approach leaves behind ideas where the market potential hasn’t been considered or recognized.
The daunting nature of learning a new skill set from scratch can create inertia and block students and faculty from acting on great ideas. How does one find or evaluate an opportunity? What is the process of testing an idea in the market? When is the best time to incorporate? Much of the effort to learn relies on self-instruction, expensive trial and error, or advice through informal networks.
Instead, students could benefit from courses, workshops and internships with a focus on entrepreneurship early in their studies, and more broadly across disciplines.
In an ideal world, students or faculty shouldn’t feel like going to the market with an idea is an impossible prospect. But presently, commercialization can feel out of grasp, especially for disciplines such as health care that fall outside of management studies.
Within health faculties, including nursing, pharmacy and medicine, commercialization can be an uncomfortable topic. Especially when business activities, such as sales, can be seen as incongruent with the values of health care professionals. But scholar-entrepreneurs have made great contributions to the health care ecosystem that have advanced our ability to provide care.
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Notably, biotechnology professor Robert Langer, who co-founded Moderna in 2010 while at MIT, revolutionized vaccine development through the mRNA technology that played a pivotal role in the COVID-19 pandemic. Moderna has also produced a vaccine for respiratory syncytial virus, offering protection to higher-risk individuals from the common infection.
Scholar-entrepreneurs are bringing technological advancements to the doorsteps of society at large. In 2021, Raquel Urtasun of the University of Toronto’s department of computer science founded Waabi, building software that powers autonomous, self-driving trucks.
The impact of scholar-entrepreneurs on society is striking, and when we overlook the importance of their education, we leave talented people with great ideas undiscovered.
Students also have much to gain from entrepreneurship education. We are currently experiencing one of the toughest job markets in a generation. Some students have never considered undertaking their own venture, and early exposure could help open an otherwise closed career path. This is especially timely as artificial intelligence powers tools that enable entrepreneurship like never before.
By unlocking this potential, institutions can help students create jobs of their own and develop practical skills that accelerate their professional journey.
The benefits are clear. The case for entrepreneurship education is compelling for students, institutions and society alike, and forgoing our chance to transform more of our universities into hubs for venture creation would be a lost opportunity.
