Students Preparing for Visit to Macedonia

The photo in this blog is of the group of students who will be travelling to Macedonia during the first week of October. In the center is Dr. Sumansky. To his left (in the photo) is teaching assistant and Macedonia native Ms. Maki McCann. To his right (in the photo) is Ms. Carolyn Yencharis-Corcoran, the International Study coordinator at Misericordia.

Students are (left to right): Ms. Emilie Pearson, Mr. William DesRosiers, Mr. Eric Williams and Mr, Frank Yamrick.

The class has begun reading the volumes of writing on the combined topics of entrepreneurship, economic development and public policy. We have met several times to set the stage for one semester's work leading to student-designed policy recommendations for enhancing regional economic growth and development through the promotion of entrepreneurship. It is our hope to organize and present a student-led briefing for NEPA's economic development decision makers sometime in late January or early February 2009.

One impetus for this course came from the fact that Macedonia, as a nation, is heavily involved in entrepreneurship promotion as part of its national public policy for economic growth. Like Macedonia, many regions of the US and other nations of the world have begun using entrepreneurship to help grow their economies. One example of the increased focus on entrepreneurship worldwide can be seen in the August 2, 2008 ECONOMIST that reported that "An effort to promote entrepreneurship in the developing world is nearing fruit".

Macedonia - like NEPA - hopes that entrepreneruship will lead to economic growth and prosperity. Misericordia students will have an opportunity to talk with Macedonia's decision makers about their entrepreneurship policies and see some of the efforts first hand, such as a new business incubator. MU students are required to visit to Wilkes Barre's own incubator and so will have the opportunity to compare and contrast - first hand - the two incubators as vehicles for entrepreneurship promotion.

Much more to come as MU students go about learning all about the characteristics of entrepreneurs in both countries, theories of economic development that are relevant to each country and to examine closely how culture, law and politics impact public policy.

Stay tuned.