Business Commons^™

A Case Study Of Rural Community Colleges' Transition To Entrepreneurship, James D. Genandt

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The traditional role of workforce training by community colleges in support of regional economic development is insufficient to help rural areas survive in a global economy. Rural community colleges are uniquely positioned to provide enhanced economic development support through entrepreneurship and small business development programs. Using Woolcock and Narayan's conceptualization of social capital, the purpose of this case study of 4 community colleges in a midwest state was to identify specific entrepreneurship strategies rural community colleges use relative to economic development. The data were collected via email and telephone interviews with 11 employees connected to leadership and/or economic development from …