Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Development in African Higher Education Institutions
This thought leadership project aims to foster the development of active entrepreneurship ecosystems across higher education institutions within the Sub-Saharan Africa region. The project will highlight Afro-centric pedagogies and curriculum, governance, policy support, mentorships, funding, stakeholders, and cultural systems of formal entrepreneurship training in African higher education institutions. It also engages participant higher education institutions as partners in the process of reviewing, developing, and tracking the ecosystems on their campuses. The project provides three key resources that will be included in an e-playbook to aid higher education institutions in exploring, understanding, and measuring their entrepreneurship ecosystem environment in a way that allows them to develop interventions that move them closer to their entrepreneurship ecosystem aspirations.
The three key resources are:
- A desk study report that explores the internal entrepreneurship ecosystem of higher education institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa to arrive at a definition of and a framework to aid higher education institutions to describe their ecosystems. In addition, the report identifies appropriate methodology for the study of entrepreneurship ecosystems was and establishes a theory of change with its associated transition process.
- A series of comprehensive entrepreneurship case studies curated from exemplar institutions, compiled into a single document that looks at entrepreneurial ecosystem building within Sub-Saharan African higher educational institutions.
- An institutional entrepreneurship ecosystem diagnostic tool – available by July, 2024. All institutions interested in piloting the tool should contact education.collaborative@ashesi.edu.gh
Project Descriptive Model
QUICK INFO
Learn more about the Project in our EED Project Desk Study Report
For further inquiries on participation, membership info, and workshops, fill out our Expression of Interest form: Expression of Interest or contact: education.collaborative@ashesi.edu.gh
Project Team
Project Lead
Dr. Sena Agbodjah Agyepong
Project Management Assistant
Elorm Dela Brown
Dr Sena Agbodjah is a Senior Lecturer of Entrepreneurship and Project Management and serves as the Head of the Business Administration Department at Ashesi. She holds a BSc. and PhD in Building Technology from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) and is a Project Management Professional (PMP). Her primary research and project interest areas are in urban and rural enterprise development; African-centered early childhood education curriculum development; unpacking entrepreneurship ecosystems; supporting start-up universities in developing curriculum development and academic affairs structuring; telling the African story with a focus on African youth and women. Her future work focuses on research and projects concerned with ecovillage building, leveraging community resources: capacity and skillsets of community members and other local resources, to co-build sustainable ecovillages while building sustainable entrepreneurship ecosystems towards the achievement of Africa’s Agenda 2063 goals and aspirations.
Website: www.senaagyepong.com
Dr Murithi is the project co-lead. He has over 11 years’ experience working in the higher education sector in the UK, Ghana and Kenya. He holds a Visiting Research Fellow position with the Centre of Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CEI) at De Montfort University, UK. He has a PhD in Entrepreneurship and Family Business (UK), an MSc. In International Business and Entrepreneurship (UK) and BCOM in Finance and Banking (KE). His research has been published in international journals, books and presented in international conferences. His research interests cut across Entrepreneurship, Strategy, Family Business, Institutional Environment, and Regional Development.
Annstellah Gakii is a doctoral researcher in the school of business, Kenyatta University, Kenya. Stellah, as she prefers to be called, is currently an assistant researcher for Education collaborative in Ashesi University, Ghana. She holds an MBA degree awarded by Kenyatta University. Her research interests include Entrepreneurship, digital marketing, e-tourism, and Social Networks. She has contributed to international conferences and published in international journal
Elorm is currently the Program Coordinator for the Business Administration department at Ashesi University. He is an alum of Ashesi University and holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. He has deep interest in Entrepreneurship, Economics, Strategy and Policy. He is a member of the PMI Ghana Chapter and is currently pursuing a PMP certification.
On this project, he supports the project leads with planning, coordination, monitoring, and key administrative activities. With an active interest in Entrepreneurship, he is looking forward to providing a unique perspective on HEIs can have a more Afrocentric approach to developing robust Entrepreneurship ecosystems.