Entrepreneurial Education and the Entrepreneurial University: The Challenge of Creating an Institutional Entrepreneurship Ecosystem in a Factor Driven Economy

Background: After many decades, entrepreneurship education is now frequently embedded in universities globally. Even so challenges often remain. In a factor-driven economy like Egypt, the twin concepts of entrepreneurship education and the entrepreneurial university are somewhat new. Accordingly, this research explores, through a study of five of the country’s universities, the level of understanding of the twin concepts and the challenges the universities encounter when attempting to implement them. Conclusion: The study concludes that only one of the 5 Egyptian universities studied may be regarded as an entrepreneurial university and that although all of them offer programmes in entrepreneurship and have plans to extend their involvement, they are facing numerous challenges. The article makes recommendations for both the universities and the Egyptian Government, and argues for a national policy that requires the country’s universities both to become entrepreneurial and to introduce entrepreneurial education to all students. The findings have relevance for economies other than Egypt that are seeking to compete in the global knowledge economy. Keywords: Entrepreneurship education, entrepreneurial universities, ecosystem, government policy, egypt.