Alumni Joint Master Entrepreneurship (UvA/VU) often pursue entrepreneurial careers

An annual survey held by the program directors of the Joint Master Entrepreneurship (UvA/ VU), Bram Kuijken and Enno Masurel, has found that 17.8% of alumni have founded their own company and 11.0% are currently working freelance. Additionally, the study found that 41.9% of alumni is employed by a startup (19.7%) or a scale-up (22.2%). The joint program is a collaboration between Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the University of Amsterdam and has been running for the past five years. The annual survey tracks alumni satisfaction with the program and their employment status after graduation.

Entrepreneurship as a career
At IXA, we support startups with an academic background through training, workshops and advice. We are excited to see the numbers of alumni pursuing a career in entrepreneurship growing. A whopping 47.4% of alumni found employment within three months after graduation, 20.5% found employment within 3-6 months. The percentage of alumni that found a job before or within 3 months of graduation has been increasing over the years, perhaps due to the growing interest in entrepreneurship as a career.

Demographics
Almost one-third of students come from all over the world, adding a wide range of perspectives to the student-body. Women have continued to be underrepresented in the master program throughout the years, with only 25.4% of all alumni being female. An additional survey among the students in the current academic year (2019/2020) showed that 48.1% has an academic background other than business or economics, e.g. in technical or social sciences. This leads us to believe that entrepreneurship is no longer just a career option for business grads but is also considered more often amongst social and beta scientists.

Satisfaction
The average satisfaction score from alumni is a 4.07 on a 5-point scale, with a low standard deviation of 0.66. Over the past three years, the average satisfaction score has been increasing! The Joint Master Entrepreneurship teaches students how to be more entrepreneurial which the program directors believe benefits them as business owners or employees but also as individuals.

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