Online learning helps entrepreneurs in developing countries

Publish date	2008-08-14
Available Articles	Full articles without membership

Wharton University has launched a distance learning initiative to help women entrepreneurs in developing countries.

The school’s Aresty Institute for Executive Education has developed the programme as part of the ‘10,000 Women’ initiative from Goldman Sachs. The aim of the project, which brings together universities in the developed world with partners in emerging economies, is to provide business and management education to 10,000 underserved women, predominantly in developing and emerging markets.

The Women Entrepreneurship Education Initiative will offer a Certificate of Professional Development for Women Entrepreneurs, providing participants with essential business knowledge to build and lead successful enterprises.

Wharton will design the programme for women entrepreneurs and deliver it in collaboration with local partners such as the American University in Cairo, Egypt, and the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad, India. The programme will use classroom sessions, workshops, and distance learning modules coordinated through the Knowledge@Wharton portal, which delivers knowledge and thought leadership on a variety of business topics, including entrepreneurship, to more than one million subscribers around the world.

In addition, as part of the project, Wharton’s Joseph H Lauder Institute will develop original business school case studies addressing challenges facing companies in developing countries.

Rita McGlone of the Aresty Institute said: “Many women entrepreneurs in developing countries have instinctive skills. This programme will empower them by helping to formalize those skills with sound business knowledge and frameworks.”

10,000 Women (www.10000women.org) brings together academic partners, development organizations, and Goldman Sachs to support pragmatic, flexible, and shorter-term academic programmes as well as degree programmes for thousands of women.

The initiative will also support research on local challenges, mentoring, networking, and capacity building of academic institutions in developing countries.

The initial partnerships will support pragmatic, flexible and shorter term programs, resulting in business and management certificates that can open doors for thousands of women whose financial and practical circumstances prevent them from receiving a traditional business education. There will also be a select number of MBA and BA degrees conferred.

In addition to funding tuition for business and management education, 10,000 Women will work with development organizations to better understand the local challenges girls and young women must overcome so more of them can realize economic opportunity and achieve their full potential.

Many of these partnerships will seek to establish mentoring and networking channels for women and encourage career development opportunities.

Wharton dean, Thomas Robertson, said: “Wharton is proud to join Goldman Sachs and other leading business schools to unleash the power of entrepreneurship, especially among women in developing and emerging countries. Business schools can be a force for good in the world, and this collaboration is an excellent way of fulfilling that promise.”

Other academic partners in the programme include the American University of Afghanistan, Pan-African University in Nigeria, and the School of Finance and Banking in Rwanda.

Keywords: women, entrepreneurs, Goldman Sachs, emerging economies.

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