Last summer, Dr. Simran Kahai traveled to Bareilly, India, to visit Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Rohilkhand University (MJPRU), located in one of the country’s poorer states. There she met with MJPRU’s Vice Chancellor among other faculty, staff, and students to finalize plans to expand JCU’s Global Business Culture & Entrepreneurship Program with a new project.
“The main idea is to engage with entrepreneurs around the world from a marginalized population and impart our entrepreneurship training to them,” explains Dr. Kahai, the founder and director of the Global Business Culture & Entrepreneurship Program.
As a Boler College associate professor of economics and endowed professor of international business, Dr. Kahai incorporates projects and opportunities for students to engage with their international peers into every class she teaches, whether Global Health Economics, International Business, and Global Entrepreneurship, or Study India and Discover the World courses.
Empowering Students Through Access to Education
“I want students to say that they can achieve, that their ideas are worthy to the world, and that they can add value to society by doing what they do best,” says Dr. Kahai.
Through GBCE programming, Dr. Kahai teaches students about idea development and expansion plans, which often opens them up to new possibilities. Through guidance and working through their questions: How do we find the marketplace? Where’s the customer? How do we search for that through market research and analysis? How are we going to get loans? Students change their views from “oh, I never thought that I could launch this idea,” she explains.
Dr. Kahai adds, “I’ve met so many students who have great ideas and are looking for someone to show them the path. They have the desire to work hard and prerequisite ideas, but they don’t have a path. They don’t have the forum to thrive. If we can be the forum and teach them how to do it, that would be the way.”
In partnership with MJPRU, Dr. Kahai will design and deliver the same global entrepreneurship program, but adjusted to meet the needs of this community. The program, she explains, “is highly customized to the population that we serve, and it is focused more on helping them, instead of just trying to make money – this is mission-driven work.”
The goal then, she explains, is “to help students in that part of the world become more knowledgeable about entrepreneurship and empower them with the training to learn how to raise money, how to market, how to develop their ideas to make them a reality.”
Curriculum Built for Impact
However, adapting the program curriculum comes with a unique set of challenges. For example, reaching people who may not have internet access requires innovative technology solutions, and the curriculum must be translated into the many languages spoken across the region.
It’s a joint effort between John Carroll and MJPRU faculty. Dr. Kahai shares, “they were very, very welcoming, and they really want to work on the project with us. So their faculty members were very good at giving me input on how to customize it. And helping me with the translation of the curriculum.”
Dr. Kahai is also working with industrial psychologists to develop the program curriculum and address some complex issues this marginalized group faces.
“I am building relationships with…[MJPRU faculty and students]…to identify their challenges. So that the psychologists that I’m working with can design what to train them with. I’m kind of the glue that connects the dots, ” explains Dr. Kahai.
Inspired by Jesuit Values and Creating a Global Mindset
“I’m so impressed by how we do our Jesuit way, and I felt there is so much value to be added all over the world. I also want our John Carroll students to interact and see the world outside of our campus and be able to interact in real-time with real entrepreneurs and real students that are from very different populations,” says Dr. Kahai.
It’s her hope to continue expanding Boler’s global entrepreneurship programs and international initiatives to many other countries once the pilot project in India is underway.