Marshall Professor named ‘Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year’

Professor Kathleen Allen of USC Marshall School of Business has been awarded the 2014 Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year award. Past winners of the award include Tom Byers of Stanford University and Steven P. Nichols of  University of Texas, Austin.

The new year has started on a good note for USC Marshall School of Business, USA. On January 10, the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) awarded its prestigious 2014 Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year Award to USC Marshall School of Business Professor Kathleen Allen.

The award is given to an entrepreneurship educator who has provided distinguished leadership in the field and contributed greatly to the way scholars think about and approach entrepreneurship teaching and learning. In bestowing the award, the USABE award committee cited the number of books and publications Allen has contributed to the field and highlighted her work on the forefront of technology commercialization.

In nominating Allen for the award, James Ellis, dean of the Marshall School, acknowledged that Allen, a USC professor for more than 20 years, has significantly contributed to the “national and international dialogue on entrepreneurship education.”

“Dr. Allen has been instrumental in building our curriculum [and] spearheading our university’s earliest interdisciplinary efforts in entrepreneurial education,” Ellis continued. “It is impossible to have a conversation with Dr. Allen without recognizing her immense, sincere, and deep commitment to both the educational experience and to entrepreneurship education as a whole.”

Greif Center Co-Director Helena Yli-Renko emphasized Allen’s “significant innovations” in taking the field of entrepreneurship beyond the business school. “She has been a vocal advocate,” Yli-Renko said, “of teaching entrepreneurship to engineers, scientists, medical doctors, and others with non-business backgrounds.”

Allen, also a founding director of the Marshall Center for Technology Commercialization, is the author more than 15 books in the field of entrepreneurship and technology commercialization including the leading texts Launching New Ventures and Entrepreneurship for Scientists and Engineers. She works with scientists and engineers to identify markets and applications for their technologies, develop commercialization teams, and prepare to seek funding and has been active in the commercialization of space entrepreneurship and ensuring that broadband is delivered to rural areas.

USASBE is the largest independent, professional, academic organization in the world dedicated to advancing the discipline of entrepreneurship. It is presently comprised of more than 1,000 member institutions—including primarily, but not exclusively, universities and colleges.

The announcement is is another feather in the cap for the Los Angeles based USC Marshall School of Business which
is internationally recognized for its emphasis on entrepreneurship and innovation.