Ishika Gupta
Pronouns: she/her/hers
Research Mentor(s): Emmanuel Yimfor
Research Mentor School/College/Department: Finance / Business
Program: UROPF
Session: Session 2 (10:00am – 10:50am)
Authors:
Abstract
Entrepreneurs are not equally successful in their attempts to find funding from alumni. In the past, reasons for this have been investigated by examining the frequency of alumni reunions which trace back to the common university attended by both entrepreneurs and alumni. However, trends in relation to specific factors like age and ethnicity have been neglected. This research seeks to address previously unexplored connections between identities like minorities and women, delving deeper into the question of whether disparities in opportunities for funding can be attributed to differences in representation. In order to achieve this, exploration of the frequency with which alumni reunions are held for various universities across the world and within the United States as well as researching the profiles of such entrepreneurs will need to be done. A qualitative method will then be used when collecting profile pictures and determining the ethnicity of entrepreneurs based on these images. The hypothesis for this research follows that alumni reunions being more frequent does affect the amount of funding entrepreneurs receive. Furthermore, it is proposed that it is less likely for minorities to be included in these benefits. The implications of the findings will reveal important information about how well connected alumni networks are after graduation and what the diversity of their investment portfolio looks like. Such trends are useful for understanding the availability of opportunities for alumni to begin suggesting solutions to bridge these gaps.
