Pratt Institute’s new interdisciplinary Minor in Entrepreneurship will prepare artists and designers with an entrepreneurial mindset, business acumen, and essential skills to embark on their own creative ventures. Starting this spring, the minor will provide students with business and management expertise to apply to their careers or the development of their future businesses.
Preparing Pratt students with these much-needed business skills as creative professionals—particularly in today’s complex economic environment where having experience with markets and funding is important—was the impetus for the new program.
“The new minor gives all students, no matter their major, the business and management knowledge they need to thrive in their professional pursuits,” said Audrey Schultz, the minor’s coordinator and professor of construction/facilities management and real estate practice. “Graduates who enroll in this minor will be well poised to succeed in an array of career paths including leading their own practice, launching a new venture, and contributing to an existing business.”
The minor is available to all Pratt students after the completion of their first year and requires 15 credit hours. Students will learn how to incubate promising projects, how to financially manage their enterprise, how to work with diverse people and ideas, and how to be an ethical and mindful leader. They will also put their education to practice in an internship and get the opportunity to pitch concepts and engage with professional entrepreneurs.
As the National Endowments of the Arts reported in March 2020, the arts and cultural sector continues to be a major area of economic vitality: between 2015 and 2017 it grew at more than twice the rate of the total United States economy, fueled by expanding fields including arts-related construction and publishing. Especially in times of uncertainty, having insight into economic opportunities in the arts and how to sustain creative practices is crucial.
The minor builds on Pratt’s ongoing commitment to promoting the entrepreneurship skills that will help students advance into the professional world, with both established and new classes being brought into the program. Whether a designer founding a brand, an architect proposing a project, an arts educator joining a nonprofit, or a painter selling their work, understanding of business can empower creatives to turn their passions into flourishing careers.