Average class size. We asked lecturers about the average class size. Responses in this subsection were varied, probably because they are dependent on the specific courses’ characteristics (e.g. graduate or undergraduate). For this reason we decided to analyze range frequencies instead of calculating a general average. Results showed that most of the lecturers (22 mentions) provided a number in the range between 10 and 20 students average per class.

4. Results

4.1 Course/program objectives

This section explores the objectives and focus of the programs and courses in entrepreneurial journalism.

One of the important reasons discussed by lecturers is that an entrepreneurial attitude is needed to shape the future of an industry in transformation. The concept was discussed by 13 out of 33 (although is fair to say that it’s also implicit in most of the responses). According to David Westphal, entrepreneurial skills foster the needed cultural change in the media industry: “It's important because the news culture of the last few decades has been anti-entrepreneurial. So these courses amount to almost an antidote for long-established cultures.”

The next concept or category that was also widely mentioned throughout the study (in this question by 11 out of 33 lecturers) is fairly basic but not always welcomed: it’s an imperative in the new digital landscape for journalists to deeply understand the business and economics of journalism. This is, for most of the respondents, an essential cultural change that we believe professionals should embrace in order to confront the disruption of the industry and foster change and innovation. Another related issue mentioned several times—and that will be individually discussed in following sections—is that this understanding of the business is essential for journalists working not only as individual entrepreneurs, but also for journalists working in established media organizations or established startups. This is also related to the first category of responses of this section (the whole industry needs an entrepreneurial mindset to shape its future). As Leslie Walker explains, “News media business models have been massively disrupted, and must be reinvented for the digital age. Now more than ever journalism students need greater understanding of the business side of media and news. Even if they don't start their own news ventures, tomorrow's graduates likely will be involved in intrapreneurial initiatives for media companies”.

This leads us to another related concept (mentioned by 14 out of 33 lecturers) widely discussed in this section: journalists need the skills to exploit the opportunities arising from the digital landscape and the low barriers to entry. One important concept examined in this category of responses is, as explained by James Breiner, that opportunities that arise for entrepreneurs in the digital landscape are not only business opportunities but also journalistic opportunities: “Journalists have an opportunity to fill the gaps left by traditional media, which are cutting staff and coverage. There is a business and a journalistic opportunity here. The journalistic opportunity is to identify niches of reader interest not being adequately served by mass media now, and there are many: environment, education, local business, gender, local culture and language, local data, cultural coverage... the list is virtually infinite. The business opportunity is to create a community that will be attractive to both users of the community and those who want to reach that community. Beyond advertising, other possibilities for monetizing a community are direct sales of products, sale of specialized information, consulting in communication, and membership (members will often pay much more than subscribers), events and foundations, to name a few. The course is necessary because most journalists who launch a product on the web lack basic business skills, such as identifying a target audience, creating marketing to attract the target audience, developing various ways to monetize the attention on the web and so on”.

The next two categories of responses were implicitly and explicitly mentioned and discussed above, and emerge together several times in the responses. The first category (mentioned by 18 out of 33) groups responses affirming that entrepreneurial skills (and the ability to identify and exploit opportunities discussed above) prepare students to create their own jobs. This is particularly relevant in a context of massive layoffs in the industry and shrinking media operations. Tim McGuire accentuated the idea of the changing labor market: “Most of the jobs they will occupy during their career don't exist right now.”

In the second category (mentioned by 11 out of 33) we grouped responses related to the idea that entrepreneurial skills are also essential for professionals to work in transforming media companies and new media startups that already require journalists to participate in intrapreneurial projects and embrace an entrepreneurial mindset.

Teaching focus.Next we explored two issues related to the focus of the courses/programs. First, if teaching is centered in new venture creation or intrapreneurship (that is, entrepreneurship in established organizations or corporate entrepreneurship); and second, if teaching is targeted to to non-journalism students.73% (24) of the lecturers teach in courses/programs that are focused on both, new ventures entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship (entrepreneurship in established organizations); 21% (8) in courses focused exclusively on new ventures; and none in courses exclusively focused on intrapreneurship.

Whether entrepreneurship is an activity related exclusively to new venture creation or within existing firms is a common topic in academic entrepreneurship literature. Consistent with what was discussed in the first section of this study, we found that a majority of the lecturers tend to address both approaches to entrepreneurship. Results show a conception of entrepreneurship more focused on creating and exploiting opportunities, regardless of the context where this activity takes place.

Then, we examined whether the courses are open to non-journalism students. The results show that 22 out of 33 lecturers (69%) integrate non-journalism students into their courses. In fact, some courses/programs are centered on entrepreneurship in media as a whole, including journalism. An example is the Center for Digital Media Entrepreneruship at Syracuse University, that is open to all students at Newhouse, “junior, seniors, grad students”, explained Sean Branagan, director of the Center: “My course is broader than just entrepreneurship in journalism; we include all professional disciplines in the school and believe that this adds to the strength and vibrancy of the teams, the ideas, and business.”

Unique characteristics of entrepreneurial journalism. In this subsection we asked lecturers what is unique about entrepreneurship in journalism and communication as compared to entrepreneurship in other businesses. Media management and media economics academic fields have been widely defined by the application of economic and management theory to the unique characteristics of media products, companies and markets. Lecturers in entrepreneurial journalism identify these unique characteristics and treat them as important issues to address, and that should no longer beused as a justification to build a wall between the business and editorial sides of the journalistic work. In fact, lecturers and entrepreneurial journalists tend to argue that these barriers were detrimental for the industry and got journalists disengaged from their audiences.

The first one, mentioned by 12 out of 33 lecturers is related to the social function, ethics and the public good nature of media products: “Journalists operate with a sense of mission, and journalism is a service that is broadly considered a public good essential to democracy. In other words, there are externalities involved that are not present in many other industries. The key in teaching entrepreneurship may be to explore the nexus of how that sense of mission is supported by a business model, when the two are in conflict and mechanisms for resolving that tension,” stated Kelly Toughill.

The second most cited point, by eight out of 33 lecturers (and widely mentioned throughout the study), is the anti-business culture in journalism and journalism students. This is, according to entrepreneurial journalism lecturers, a unique characteristic of entrepreneurship in journalism and media as compared to entrepreneurship in other businesses. Ava Seave agrees with this established characterization of the journalism profession: “Journalists in the past didn't worry their pretty little heads about how the business they were working for prospered or didn't. In fact they purposely avoided the business side, afraid it would taint their reporting. This just didn't happen in other businesses or institutions. Even artists were more educated about business than journalists. So this is new”. Moreover, Eric Scherer adds that “most of the times” they are even “not motivated by money”.

When asked about additional teaching activities Kelly Toughill mentioned the importance of business simulation games: “Our students do one course in the Faculty of Management that is based on a computer simulation of a start up.” Barbra Rowlands and Lurene Kelley discussed the value of networking activities. According to Rowlands, they conduct networking evenings with experts: “We have networking evenings - complete with refreshment/beer - where the students, in their start-up groups, mix with 10 or so expert guests. They do poster presentations outlining the progress of their start-ups.” Kelley explained that networking with entrepreneurs is “a key component of our class. Most class blog posts involved students meeting entrepreneurs.” Mike Fancher conducted an “interactive public forum on journalism for jobs this semester in conjunction with a course in participatory journalism. The purpose was to demonstrate the power of journalism to create engagement around a topic.”

David Westphal explains that students in his class also perform “group presentations that study entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial companies.” Vikki Porter and Jeff Jarvis mentioned mentoring activities. According to Porter, at the Block by Block News Entrepreneurs Super Camp (professional training) they offer publishers “High touch mentoring by successful experts in sales and business development including site visits and weekly chats as well as ongoing webinars for one year after a 4-day boot camp focused on development of business plan and 100-day action plan.”

According to Jarvis, at the MA program in entrepreneurial journalism at CUNY, besides mentorship, they also include field-experience activities, technology training and a course in media business fundamentals: “Students in the MA/certificate semester create their business plans as the core of their work. They also take an abbreviated MBA-like course in business fundamentals in the media context. We study disruption in the industry. They take technology training—e.g., in product development—given to all with the ability to take specialized courses that meet their particular needs. . . They serve a brief apprenticeship in a New York startup. Being in New York is a great advantage as it brings us entrepreneurs, investors, and executives to serve as speakers, mentors, and jurors in the final judging”.

The most commonly mentioned challenge is related to the student’s background and expectations (mentioned by 11 out of 33) and with concepts such as the anti-business culture of journalists and students discussed in section one. Regarding student’s expectations, B.J. Roche raised an interesting point on the difficulties of the entrepreneurial path: “Now I worry that we're overselling entrepreneurship! It's very difficult and it requires money to start with, as well as the ability to not make a paycheck for a while, which is not in my students' profile. Once people see how hard it is to get 50,000 page views a day, they start to rethink the whole idea.”

Fitting the course into the curriculum or “into the schedule of the student curriculum”, as was articulated bySree Sreenivasan, is the second most mentioned challenge. Lecturers referred to insufficient resources for the courses and for marketing the courses given the amount of students interested; the fact that most of them remain as electives; colleagues’ distinct perceptions on journalism education; and also confusion among students and colleagues regarding the aims and scope of the courses. For example, Sarah Stuteville mentioned the confusion “in the department and among students about multimedia training vs. entrepreneurial journalism (are they the same thing, can they be taught in the same class?)”

An additional challenge mentioned by lecturers is the courses’ duration and time restrictions. Four lecturers expressed this concern. Frequently, lecturers end up summarizing in one course business and economics basics, media business and economics, technology, business model generation, startup culture, etc., plus student projects. “We have very little time in our very crowded program”, stated Angela Phillips. Ben Compaine notes that, “14 weeks is a bit too short for a comprehensive business plan, given course load and/or full time jobs.”

Also four lecturers mentioned lecturer’s background as a challenge. According to Mandy Jenkins, “A lot of research needed to happen to make this possible... and it could use more influence from business school curricula”. Tim McGuire confronted this issue when he needed to recruit new lecturers: “I invented the course and it's required, but we are finding it is difficult to find other instructors”. Lurene Kelley did overcome some of these difficulties by partnering with a business accelerator: “While I have a strong journalism background and studied organizational communication, I have never been an entrepreneur. Fortunately, I was able to partner with an entrepreneurial accelerator willing to share their time, knowledge, and resources.”

The lack of resources (mentioned three times) was widely discussed at the 2010 entrepreneurial journalism education conference call organized by Jeff Jarvis. At the conference call, and also throughout this study, lecturers expressed the need for sharing available resources (e.g. case studies).

Under “other” we grouped five responses. Ann Grimes mentioned the challenge of “forming interdisciplinary teams.” According to Vin Crosbie, there is a lack of theory development: “Developing the theories that explain the changes underway in the media environment and how those changes effect the media businesses.” Another interesting observation contributed by Larry Kramer is the geographic challenge. As we already explained, “guest speakers” is one of the most common activities in class, so the geographic barriers can easily become a challenge to some lecturers: “Geographic. I'm in NYC, where most of the guest speakers are, the students are based in Syracuse.” Steve Buttry addressed an interesting topic on “juggling class with full-time job.” As we will expose in this report, most of the lecturers are professionals, or professionals and academics. Finally, Jeff Jarvis mentioned the novelty of the courses as a challenge, especially because they were pioneers when they started.

4.3 Teaching resources

After studying the courses’ structure and objectives in this section we analyze the teaching resources in more depth.

Commonly used resources. We asked lecturers what kind of teaching resources they use in class. Below is the list of resources sorted by times mentioned (full answers available online may give readers better detail on each case).

- Online blog posts and articles (mentioned 23 times)

- Case Studies (20). Lecturers mentioned Harvard, Columbia Case Consortium and self-written cases as sources.

- Books (20).

- Guest speakers (10). According to the data from the teaching activities section of this report, we can guess that some lecturers didn’t consider guest speakers a teaching resource and so didn’t mention it again here. Some lecturers said guests sometimes participate via Skype (a solution to geographic restraints discussed above). They also mentioned some example guests such as entrepreneurs, business angels or other lecturers.

- Video: entrepreneur talks / cases / tutorials (9).For example, Ben Compaine mentioned the videos of entrepreneur’s talks from Stanford and Cornell University.

- Research reports (8).

- Business, marketing and operations plans and templates (4)

- Further resources mentioned by lecturers: Class website, Facebook and Twitter groups (2), simulation games (1), one-on-one peer to peer mentoring/coaching (1), online discussion groups in online courses (1), online multimedia projects (1), media business coverage, interactive exercises, role play games (1), take students to visit working enterprises (1), mostly online resources (1).

Shared resources. Another interesting issue is whether lecturers use general entrepreneurship resources or if they mainly use entrepreneurial journalism (or media) resources. Results show that 61% (20 lecturers) use general entrepreneurship resources and 36% (13) don’t. This may be the result of insufficient media entrepreneurial resources generally available.

What additional resources should be developed?Finally, we asked lecturers which resources they wish were available. Categories were defined through the content analysis of responses to the open-ended question.The most commonly mentioned resource is case studies (mentioned by nine lecturers). As we already explained, this was also widely discussed at the 2010 conference call on entrepreneurial journalism education organized by Jeff Jarvis. Andy Price added that cases should be “more detailed” than the ones already available. James Breiner also mentioned cases but “with more rigorous standards”. Annette Naudin asked for cases “from international practice” since the business environment and available resources (particularly philanthropic grants) are not the same in the US than in other countries.

Three lecturers mentioned Business plans and templates adapted to entrepreneurial journalism as a needed resource. Sue Heseltine and Mandy Jenkins discussed the need for textbooks. As explained by Heseltine, “More texts that are specifically related to journalism. There is a lot of discussion around these issues at conferences but they haven't filtered through into many texts yet.” Mandy Jenkins also referred to text adaptation: “Perhaps some boiled down or Cliff's Notes versions of business school texts on startups and small businesses would be of assistance.”

Two lecturers mentioned video resources. Andy Price suggested streaming practitioners’ interviews and Leslie Walker mentioned “video talks by CEOs who are trying to pioneer new business models for news”.Another resource mentioned twice is mentoring opportunities and coaching: “More media entrepreneurs to come along and work with the students”, explained Francoise Nel.

Other ideas mentioned are internships with journalism entrepreneurs; specialized simulation games (Kelly Toughill: “I wish we had a simulation game similar to CAPSIM (which is?)that could be used as the basis for an entire course. The instant feedback of simulations is a great learning tool and allows instructors with little business background to teach complex topics. I have an MBA, but most journalism professors have a meager understanding of basic financial statements, marketing principles etc.”); David Westphal suggested the need of “continued support for students' projects at semester's end”; Annette Naudin also discussed the need of further research (“Current research on aspects of entrepreneurial journalism such as the 'lived experience'. Market research and marketing studies for students to learn from… Social enterprise and new business models discussed in academic context”) and critical debates (“Critical debates - challenges facing entrepreneurial journalism”); more resources and reports on “common rules, best practices, common mistakes,” added Eric Scherer; Mike Fancher mentioned the need to count with more “people who are living the experience of entrepreneurial journalism”; and Sree Sreenivasan suggested more syllabi.

Other lecturers added other suggestions. For example, Barbara Rowlands asked for courses to become more independent from guests: “Courses like this rely on staff [to] bring in guests to mentor the students”. When answering which resources he wishes were available, Mark Potts stated: “It's harder to figure out what to leave out. It's a fast-changing field, and most of the syllabus comes from current or recent blog posts. It changes 40-50% year over year, as new posts become available.” The business is changing so fast, it is hard for teachers to keep up with what’s happening.

Annette Naudin suggested that there should be more resources also focused on small business: “A focus on small business / freelance work rather than using examples from big business”, and Andy Price alluded to resources that reflect “ideas about social enterprise in the news business.” Finally, Leslie Walker asked for a greater effort in sharing resources: “It's tiring to reinvent the media business wheel, so to speak. It would be so helpful if there were more collaborative efforts among those teaching it to share resources.”

4.4 Collaboration

In this section we explored courses’ collaboration and partnerships. We asked lecturers about the courses/programs’ home institution’s support and also if they established partnerships with business schools or business and entrepreneurship programs.

Institutional support.First we asked lecturers if they consider that entrepreneurial journalism courses are fully supported by their institutions, since entrepreneurial journalism involves a significant cultural transformation in the journalistic practice, culture and education as well.85% (28 lecturers) feel their institution is fully supportive; 9% (3) gave an intermediate answer; and there were no negative answers. That’s a good sign of strong institutional support.

Entrepreneurship courses and broader innovation efforts at journalism schools. As explained above, several journalism schools are transforming their curriculum (integrating multimedia, business and entrepreneurial skills), playing a more active role in their communities (for example through university-based community news sites) and becoming innovation hubs (funding, training, and reporting the work of entrepreneurs, organizing conferences, establishing innovation labs, etc.). In this section we asked if lecturers consider entrepreneurial courses to be part of or integrated into those broader efforts of journalism schools toward innovation in education and research.

Results show that 79% (26) of lecturers consider their course or program to be part of a wider innovation effort; 9% (3) provided an intermediate answer (grouped in “other”); and a 3% (1) answered with a no.

Collaboration with/integration to media management and media economics courses. Media management and Media economics research and teaching fields have developed throughout the 20^th century: lecturers and scholars from these fields were the first to integrate business concepts into journalism schools. At the same time, as our study shows, entrepreneurship lecturers consider that explaining the economics and business of the media represents a significant part of entrepreneurial journalism courses as well. On the other hand, a recent study with directors of journalism programs in the US found that entrepreneurial journalism courses were considered “more important” than courses in media management or media economics (Blom & Davenport, 2012). We therefore asked lecturers if their institutions offer media management or media economics courses, and (for those who answered affirmatively) how the contents of entrepreneurship courses differ from what students learn in these courses and how both type of courses are integrated.

First, we asked lecturers if their school offers any/course program in media management or media economics. Slightly less than half, 49% (16) of lecturers responded that their schools/institutions offer courses in media management or media economics, and 45% (15) responded that they don’t offer these courses. Results show a certain disengagement of journalism schools from the commercial side of the industry since in almost half of these institutions entrepreneurship courses represent the first approach to the business side of journalism.

What differentiates the entrepreneurial courses from existing media management classes?

The most mentioned difference (6 times) is that entrepreneurial courses focus on creating new projects/ventures/products. Another difference is (mentioned by five lecturers) shown in Steve Buttry’s response: “Media management and economics courses tend to focus on managing in large media organizations and on the news industry and its larger business issues and trends.” The respondents tended to relate Media management courses to established media organizations: “The traditional course in media economics at UMD is much more theoretical and focused on traditional media,” explained Leslie Walker.

Three lecturers explained that at their schools the courses are now merged. For example, Lurene Kelley explained how the media management and entrepreneurship contents were merged at the University of Memphis: “Our entrepreneurial journalism course was actually a redesign of our media management course. So the course combines content from media management and entrepreneurialism. We also use intrapreneurship as a meeting point for the management and entrepreneurship content.”

Two lecturers explained that they consider courses to be a sequence or complementary. Lastly, Farncois Nel explained how entrepreneurship is now also embedded in media management courses: “We take the need to innovative as given for all our media management courses, so seek to embed the entrepreneurial mindset throughout.”

Collaboration with business schools/general entrepreneurship programs.Next we explored if lecturers worked collaboratively with business schools or business and entrepreneurship programs, and also the nature of these partnerships.

When asked if they collaborated, 58% (19) of lecturers responded with a yes and 42% (14) with a no.

Eight lecturers explained that they work with an in-house business school or business/entrepreneurship program/center. Another type of collaboration (mentioned by six lecturers) consists of integrating lecturers from business schools or business and general entrepreneurship related programs to entrepreneurial journalism courses/programs. For example, Mark Potts (who answered with a no) explained that they established this type of collaboration, although now all lecturers have a journalism background: “Our undergrad course was formerly taught in conjunction with a business school professor; this semester, I'm teaching it—as a serial entrepreneur/business person who happens to have a journalism background—with another journalism professor.”

Other courses are part of the business school. Two lecturers actually explained that their courses “run at the business school,” as explained by Ben Compaine; or as in the case of Larry Kramer, his course “is also part of the MBA program”.

Finally,Two lecturers mentioned extra-mural partnerships. Andy Price referred to Teesside Entrepreneurs Society: “We work with an extra-mural student initiative called, Entreprenerus@tees. We do not work with the business school in this area”. Vikki Porter mentioned their collaboration with Patterson Foundation to pursue “funding, recruitment, program development.”

4.5 Lessons learned

We grouped the responses about the most important lessons learned in four categories.

The first category is related to lessons learned about students’ attitudes towards entrepreneurship. Lecturers highlighted the fact that journalists have already some entrepreneurial mindset because, as stated by Branagan, “they are tenacious, resourceful, and inquisitive. They have skills as creators, storytellers and builders... all good skills of an entrepreneur. And they are comfortable working with missing information”. But, at the same time, they need to be more focused on the execution: “One of the obstacles is learning to stop searching and start DOING! Entrepreneurship is about DOING.” Francoise Nel agreed with Branagan on these shared characteristics: “That participants delight in seeing how many of the key skills (opportunity identification, networking, etc.) that are essential to success to making great journalism can also be used to help build sustainable journalism enterprises”. Annette Naudin, BJ Roche and Sarah Stuteville emphasized additional entrepreneurial attitudes. According to Naudin, “students need to develop confidence to explore and experiment.” Roche highlighted the issue of failure: “THESE KIDS ARE NEVER ALLOWED TO FAIL AT ANYTHING. In general all their lives, they've quit at things they weren't immediately good at. They are still on the "A" thing as the only measurement. This course breaks them of that thinking. They know they need to have a million ideas, and then find another million of them until they find something that works. Then they start the process of learning when it's time to persist and when it's time to give up on an idea—that's another really key skill that most grownups don't even get”. Lastly, Stuteville mentioned two issues related to technology and opportunities: “That students easily become fixated on learning certain technologies instead of embracing a technology-curious/flexible mindset that will serve them in a shifting media landscape. That many students still expect that they will land a traditional media job (e.g.: a job as a newspaper reporter) and aren't thinking enough about the diverse media jobs/opportunities the include/embrace journalism and journalism skills.”

Eric Scherer, Burghardt Tenderich, Tim McGuire and Mike Fancher discussed lessons learned about students’ business background and attitude. According to Scherer, “journalism students are out of touch with business and economic realities… Scary!” Tenderich agrees with him in that, “most students lacked knowledge of basic business concepts. However, by the end of the semester, you could notice most students' business thinking had advanced.” McGuire explained student’s change of attitude once they start the course: “That kids have a very negative feeling about it when they begin but the content reveals important things to the students about themselves.” Mike Fancher referred to the challenge journalism is changing: “It is extremely hard to get people to re-imagine how journalism might be done differently in an interactive world.”

Lastly, Sree Sreenivasasn explained that although “this is hard work; there's great hunger for this among students”, and Angela Preciado learned that they also “get enthusiasm with the idea of being owners of their business”.

Next we grouped responses related to lessons learned regarding the courses’ structures and activities. For example, Mandy Jenkins mentioned time constraints given the wide range of content needed for the courses: “I have learned just how much work there is to not only starting your own venture, but learning all if the aspects of business that go along with it. I couldn't possibly cover everything in one class.” Steve Buttry emphasized the benefits of the project-approach to teaching entrepreneurship: “Students need to work in entrepreneurial projects that require them to think through business issues and problems”.

Jeff Jarvis mentioned several lessons learned related to continuing support for students’ projects: “If students do want to start their businesses, the real work of supporting them with mentorship and incubation begins as the class ends”; grants: “Having money to give in grants is very valuable but it can also skew the students' work too much toward the final presentation; that simply needs caution”; project-based approach: “We have found that individual projects work best; I wonder whether group projects might sometimes work better at undergraduate”; class composition: “Mixing professionals—including some from outside journalism—with journalism students is fruitful for all, though one needs to pay attention to the disconnects that can sometimes occur between them”; admissions: For admissions, we need to have students propose businesses—even though most will change—to check their attitude toward innovation and business; content priorities: “In the first year of the certificate, we gave general technology education but soon learned that more specific instruction in skills the students need—e.g., project management—is more important”; and finally, selecting students’ projects juries: “Our jury is popular but we found that juries can get too big, leading to consensus decisions rather than taking risks. We adjusted for that by taking a more active role ourselves in the decisions.”

Next we grouped comments about lessons learned on teaching and course’s contents. For example, Larry Kramer discussed the benefits of storytelling when teaching entrepreneurship: “Teaching is hard. Basic storytelling is the best form. We spend a lot of time on examples of intrapreneurism, and it's very helpful”. Alan Mutter highlighted the importance of working with students individually: “Students approach this with varying levels of understanding and insight. You have to work with each individual as an individual”. Kelly Toughill recommended a focus on basics: “Our students struggled mightily with the basic concept that a new venture must fill a perceived need, not just deliver a product”; a deeper emphasis on finances: “Finances were also a challenge. We went over finances once before they began working on their professional project. In the upcoming class, we will go over finances three times before they are expected to generate their own statements”; and constant revision: “We have realized that this stream will take more rigorous revision every year because the landscape is changing so quickly.”

James Breiner explained why is it important to “set the bar high”: “Tell students not only that they can do this, but that it is a requirement that they come up with a journalism project that they can initiate. Starting with that expectation means the participants go beyond their own expectations”. Annette Naudine also added several recommendations. She referred to the need for broadening students’ career paths: “That we need to enhance opportunities for live projects which come from a range of sources / industries - not just journalism”; the need to stay critical and updated: “That we need to stay critical - debate and challenge the industry / teaching methods. That we need to engage with debates through conferences, research, industry networks etc.”; the need to meet the challenge of working with diverse groups: “At post graduate level some of the challenges are to do with the diverse student group - this is often a neglected issue. International students still expect the UK to have a traditional media / journalism industry and causes many challenges”; and finally, the need for lecturers to participate in and run real entrepreneurial projects: “Enabling staff to work in practice / run projects / engage in practice based research is important in this fast changing sector.”

David Westphal and Barbara Rowlands discussed the project-based approach to teaching entrepreneurship. Accroding to Westphal, “It's the students' own struggle and engagement with an entrepreneurial project (feasibility of a new media startup) where the most intense learning occurs”. Rowlands mentioned the benefits of working with diverse teams: “I have found that even the most reluctant student is now excited by their media start-up. I have also learnt that the strongest teams are those of mixed skills (students from different pathways joining force).”

Tim McGuire and Vikki Porter shared additional experiences and recommendations. Tim McGuire explained one exercise to foster business model thinking and creativity: “I do one exercise where I give groups of students a business model template and then I ask them to invent a product and apply the template. The twist is the product has to be based on something in their pockets, purse or backpack. The exercise leads to wonderful creativity at the same time it teaches them the discipline of business model thinking.” Vikki Porter stated that by teaching community news publishers they learned that “success of news entrepreneurs is still a challenge,” and she also added two recommendations for lecturers: “Don't recruit showboats” and that “an exit strategy is as important as a business plan.” Finally, David Baines highlights the importance of helping students integrate the skills to recognize and exploit opportunities: “The necessity of preparing students to be able to recognize changes taking place in the media industries in general and journalism in particular and to be able to accommodate at least and ideally benefit from those changes by adapting to them and gaining new skills and knowledge throughout their career.”

Finally, other lecturers added several general conclusions about teaching entrepreneurship in media. For example, Mark Potts insisted that they are “not doing nearly enough of it!” Vin Crosbie discussed the resistance to innovation among several journalism professors: “That few journalism professors have a clue about the gargantuan changes underway in the media environment. Most simply think the change is that people are shifting their media consumption from traditional outlets to online or to new devices. The results of that misunderstanding are that they teach little more than shovelware (i.e., trying to transplant 20th Century journalism theories and practices into a new environment that doesn't support those.) I've found the students generally are more savvy about these changes than are the professors.”

Leslie Walker explained that the entrepreneurial mindset proved to be valuable in different areas of students’ life: “The big lesson or takeaway to me has been how incredibly valuable this kind of learning has been for our students in OTHER areas of their life, not just journalism and business, since entrepreneurial thinking can be applied so widely. The positive response from students has been startling and impressive”; and BJ Roche mentioned certain lessons she learnt about measuring class outcomes: “At first I had hoped we'd do some successful startups so I was measuring it that way and falling short. Then I realized that students don't have to do a startup to benefit from the ideas we talk about in class. Intrapreneurship can be just as valuable. Knowing how to connect with grownups about an idea can be a super-valuable skill in a job interview, for example. If you can identify a problem and solve it for an employer, you'll always have a job”.

Finally, Barbara Rowlands and Lurene Kelley discussed personal lessons they learned after delivering these courses: “I've learnt a lot delivering this module and it has widened my knowledge of how media startups can be monetized and combined with other industries”, explained Rowlands. Kelley highlighted the evolution of her understanding about opportunities in the transforming media environment: “I was fortunate enough to be chosen as a Fellow for the first Scripps-Howard Entrepreneurial Journalism Institute held at ASU this year. It was an amazing experience. That, coupled with my partnership with our local entrepreneurial accelerator—LaunchMemphis—has turned me into a different type of teacher and person. I certainly see our changing media environment as one huge opportunity now, no longer the depressing wreckage of an industry I once loved. It has made me, personally, more hopeful and willing to embrace risk and change.”

4.6 Lecturer profile

In this section we analyze lecturers’ profiles, particularly if they are professionals or academics and their experience in entrepreneurial ventures and other professional activities. Over half, 58% (19) of lecturers defined themselves as “both”, professionals and academics; 27% (9) as professionals; and only four lecturers, less than 12?%, as pure academics.

When asked if they have experience working in entrepreneurial ventures in journalism/media, 76% (25) of lecturers answered with a yes and 24% (8) with a no. Results show a clear predominance of professional and entrepreneurial experience among lecturers in entrepreneurial journalism, although a majority is also integrated to the academic world.

5. Conclusions and Discussion