Persons with Disabilities programme

Entrepreneurship for Persons with Disabilities Programme

This is an online course, and all support activities will also take place online.

A new course for people with disabilities who wish to start their own business begins this September.

The course will be hosted and delivered by TU Dublin through its Continuing Professional Development programme.   It is open to anyone who self-identifies as having a disability and who wishes to start their own business. However, the course is not suitable for a person who has already started their own business or simply wants to learn about entrepreneurship.

The course requires participants to have a business idea that they wish to evaluate as a sustainable enterprise. During the course, participants will cover the following topics:

• Distinctive challenges facing people with disabilities becoming self-employed
• Idea evaluation
• Customer segmentation
• Customer relationships and channels
• Clarifying the Value Proposition
• Balancing business and personal well-being
• Key business activities
• Key resources and partners
• Developing financial projections
• Test marketing your idea
• Understanding legal matters
• Presenting your business plan
  
  

The module will include a range of Guest Speakers whose experience and expertise are relevant to the target audience. Using a newly-developed online tool that will enable participants to develop their idea on a week-by-week basis, plus adopting Universal Design for Learning principles, a customised experiential learning approach will allow each participant to maximise their learning from the course.

The course will consist of 12 lectures followed by a 4-week period to allow for the completion and submission of a Business Plan. The course is being offered at NFQ Level 6 of the Irish National Framework of Qualifications (NFQ), and successful participants will be awarded 5 ECTS credits. Participants on the course will be students of TU Dublin and will therefore be eligible to access any of TU Dublin’s resources (e.g. library, disability support services). Additionally, each participant will be allocated a business mentor who will support them with the development of their business idea.