The College of Business is offering a new idea for students at Iowa State — a survey class in the area of entrepreneurship, or starting a business.

J. David Hunger, a professor of business management, and other professors in the College of Business have designed a new curriculum for students of any ISU college to take if starting a business is something they would consider doing someday.

This series of classes will be offered for the first time this spring semester. Iowa State may be the only university in the state to offer entrepreneurship as a major, Hunger said.

There are two prerequisites to this course set, he added, Economics 101 and Accounting 284. The other option, of course, is to obtain the instructor’s permission.

Hunger said the purpose of this series is to educate on entrepreneurial activity. It can be a major, but it is recommended to take it along with another major or minor. The focus of the series is to teach the knowledge and skills needed to run, finance and create a new business, or manage a small or family owned business.

The series starts off with Management 310x. Hunger said the focus of the class is to analyze, develop, organize, finance and manage a new venture. Outside speakers with expertise in entrepreneurships will speak about their experiences.

This class is very basic but covers a lot of topics, said Howard Van Auken, associate professor at the college of business.

“We want to be in touch with the students. We want to make the curriculum meet the needs of the students,” Van Auken said.

After the series is completed, students return to the classes their college has developed to build from the skills they learned in 310x.

The other classes offered after 310x are entrepreneurship and innovation, and competitive strategy. Entrepreneurship and innovation is a more in depth look at what 310x covers. Competitive strategy looks at competition in the industry and offers ways to develop competitive strategy and learning how to keep a business alive.

Following that, students have a choice between new venture management and dynamics of small business management.

After the series is complete, there are electives that are offered in the College of Business for the entrepreneurship major. The other colleges will or are developing classes to complement this course of study.

The faculty for the entrepreneurship classes are professors from different college departments or have either special interest or expertise in strategy or entrepreneurship areas.

These classes will be in the 1997-1999 catalog, and flyers have been given to advisers with greater detail of how to register for these classes.