Universities debate female start-ups

Entrepreneurship is now taught in European universities as part of the curricula and start-up support systems are becoming increasingly available.

Whilst women represent around 50% of students at universities they are very much unrepresented in terms of scientific or entrepreneurial careers.

FemStart has looked at specific opportunities which encourage women in science to choose entrepreneurship as a career path. FemStart has discussed how entrepreneurship support structures in universities might be optimised to reach their full potential by encouraging more women to think about an entrepreneurial career.

A series of 6 events has taken place in Stuttgart (DE), Valencia (ES), Wroclaw (PL), Riga (LV), Twente (NL) and Bucharest (RO) which have initiated a public debate on issues such as,
- why the situation is as it is
- which organisations have tried and succeeded (or failed) in increasing the number of women starting their own business after university and
- which organisations have developed good practice outside the university start-up environment which could be transferred to others.

A total of 522 participants had the opportunity to discuss these issues with 88 speakers.

As a result of what has been learnt from each individual event, a leaflet with recommendations has been published and is available to download from this site or can be ordered from the Coordinator. The recommendations are a source of knowledge for regions that could not be covered by the initiative.

The FemStart website will remain online until at least the middle of 2010. Please note, however, that the news section and other information will not be updated frequently.