Abstract:

Over the past five years, university students have been involved in different leadership and innovation projects and activities. Such projects and activities are particularly about the incubation of start-up firms in which the students try to commercialize their knowledge by taking entrepreneurship courses to develop partnerships and the delivery of their innovative products and services at the technology parks of the universities. This study aims to explore the effects of the entrepreneurship courses on developing startups at the technology parks in Turkey.

In order to understand the real effects of taking entrepreneurship courses in establishing startups, the data were collected first using a phenomenological concept analysis. The concept was overviewed by critically analyzing related documents. Then, in the second part, empirical phenomenological research was done in order to have comprehensive descriptions by using “reflective structural analysis of the essences of the experience” (Moustakas, 1994, p. 2). Therefore, the original data were gathered from ‘naive’ descriptions by asking open-ended questions and dialogue. The researcher described the experiences based on reflection and interpretation of the research participant’s story. The aim of the study is to determine what the experience means for the people who have had the experience of entrepreneurial courses to establish startup companies.

By using a critical phenomenological analysis, the study generates a perspective about the effects are critically analyzed before and after the entrepreneurial courses taken at the technology parks of two different universities. Hence, in the first part, the last regulations related to the university-industry-government partnership had been articulated in order to understand critically how the last regulations make changes in the universities’ “human capital” policies as national strategies. After analyzing the data about the reasons behind these short entrepreneurial courses, it is so clear that the reasons are coming not only from national, but also from supranational arenas where innovation and knowledge are taken as drivers of the competitiveness and growth. By generating technological knowledge commodified in the global market economy, the new startup at the technology parks can empower the private industries in the competitive global markets. More importantly, they can decrease the unemployment rate and the country’s current account deficit.

In the second part of this study, by using a phenomenological research analysis, the effects of the entrepreneurial courses were analyzed. The results were finalized by processing Atlas.ti to understand deeply the complex structure of the courses and the effects on the university students who played important roles at the technology parks. Most (83%) participants could find better opportunities in establishing startups at the techno-parks of the universities since they could develop better networks. However, some (42%) women complained about the "boy clubs" of the startups where only men were dominantly finding place. The results showed that these courses supported most (91%) students particularly in the engineering departments while they were developing innovative products and services. Even though most (79%) students were not happy of the contents of these courses, they strongly suggested to be a part of these courses where they had developed strong network to reach financial opportunities.

Keywords:

Technology parks, Higher Education, Innovation, Startups.