Survey finds record numbers of entrepreneurs in UK universities

by James Agate

It turns out that students aren’t just a mob that descend on London to cause chaos and destruction. All sensible human beings realised this but unfortunately the media of late has sought to destroy the little remaining credibility that higher education students had. The recent protests against the rise in tuition fees turned sour after a small minority decided to set about causing criminal damage. I suspect that many of these individuals are unlikely to be the ones starting businesses alongside their studies but rather encouragingly a survey published last week that the number of student startups rose by nearly 27% compared with the last study that was carried out in 2007.

The study of enterprise in English universities was published by the National Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship (NCGE). It represents just over 1.8million students so is arguably fairly accurate.

• Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) have become more enterprising with most institutions now committed to it through their mission statements
• The student engagement rate in enterprise and entrepreneurship has risen by nearly 50%

The interest in business and the desire the start a business could be attributed to the rise in popularity of programmes lik Dragons’ Den and The Apprentice as well as the rising profile of superstar businesspeople like Lord Alan Sugar, Peter Jones, Theo Paphitis, Richard Branson and Deborah Meaden. Programmes like The Secret Millionaire have also helped to improve the image of entrepreneurs both in the sense that people can see that wealthy individuals aren’t just money-grabbing leeches on society they create wealth, employment and genuinely care about others. I think programmes like The Secret Millionaire have also helped to transform the role of the entrepreneur as the equivalent of a rockstar in the sense that younger people see business as a viable way to build wealth, fame, respect and the life that they seek.

These reasons could also be why more students than ever are starting their own businesses. I think it is important to remember that higher education is a great time to start a business because the majority of students are young and have few financial committments  so if they don’t start a business now then they may not get the chance to later on in life. Also higher education isn’t renowned for being that much of a drain on your time so if you have the time why not do something productive.

Ian Robertson, CEO of NCGE explained, “The ongoing public investment is having a positive impact and this is also being translated into increased levels of start-up.”

Ian highlighted the challenges ahead; “Although the Award finalists are inspirational, and the results of the survey are really encouraging, we need to secure more student engagement from areas other than business and management. ”

I think that is key because entrepreneurs exist from more backgrounds than just business and management courses.