L. William Crotty Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership

The L. William Crotty Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership at the University of Dayton provides a distinctive approach to university entrepreneurship education. This multidisciplinary entrepreneurship major and program, designed to meet the educational needs of future entrepreneurs, gives students the opportunity to start actual micro-businesses and offers exposure to rapid growth companies and regular contact with successful entrepreneurs.

The Crotty Advisory Council, comprised of entrepreneurs and economic development leaders, reviews our entrepreneurship curriculum and extracurricular activities and often supplements classroom instruction, allowing entrepreneurship students to learn from a combination of the best academic scholarship and successful business practice.

Finally, with our many extracurricular offerings considered among the best in America, our students have opportunities for business consulting, internships, mentorships and student competitions in commercial real estate and business plans. Regularly scheduled luncheons with highly respected entrepreneurs from the greater Miami Valley area add more experiential learning to our academic program. We are consistently ranked by the Princeton Review as one of the best entrepreneurship programs in the nation, from a 2,000 program examination, adding testimony to the character and rigor of our entrepreneurship program.

Working in teams of five students under the direction of successful former entrepreneurs, sophomore entrepreneurship majors at the University of Dayton develop ideas and create micro-companies with the Crotty Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership providing over $70,000 in venture capital to the year long student run businesses. "They may establish an apparel business, produce coffee mugs, artistic posters or even a one pound gummy bear," explains Vince Lewis,  Director of the Crotty Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership.

In his distinguished career, entrepreneur and benefactor Bill Crotty has seen what can happen "when remarkable individuals with courage and conviction start new companies. New ideas and new budding entrepreneurs, educated at the University of Dayton's entrepreneurship program, will positively change the patterns of life."