The first-of-its kind certificate lets students work hand-in-hand with industry professionals, such as Fat Joe, DJ Khaled, Jordan Brand’s Reggie Saunders and Def Jam founding Director of Publicity Bill Adler. Assignments include everything from writing educational raps to analyzing music videos with theory and data. This semester MC Serch will join a class to break down the music video for the 1989 3rd Bass single “The Gas Face,” a provocative take on the business crossover of hip-hop.

C. Keith “Doc” Harrison, who is the founding director of the certificate program and one of its professors, designed its four courses to bridge topics ranging from the innovation and evolution of hip-hop to sport business management and entrepreneurship. His goal is to generate an elite group of business-savvy students who think differently, think globally and hustle forward. 

While the courses focus on hip-hop, the goal of the certificate isn’t necessarily to provide students with a path to working in the music, entertainment or sports industries. It aims to challenge the way they think and approach situations and encourage thinking on a global scale. The certificate flips the script of hip-hop’s typical use in academia as a vehicle for religious, sociological, humanities or liberal arts learning by complementing these academic disciplines. The certificate program focuses on the business side of an industry that has been around since the 1970s and the impact it has had across music, entertainment and sports.

“Our goal is to make the certificate completion very, very selective,” says Harrison, who serves as a Nasir Jones Hiphop Fellow at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research. “The four courses are quite rigorous, so our approach since the launch is to keep the finish line for only an elite group. We want it to be like becoming a pro athlete or artist (e.g. ballers) — top 1% to 5%.”

The Ballers

By this end of the Spring 2023 semester, four students will have finished the certificate program. Since its inception, the certificate’s marquee course, SPB4023 – Business of HipHop Innovation and Entrepreneurship, has filled up each semester as students continue to show a growing interest in the certificate’s offerings.

One of the first to complete the certificate is Denis Perez, who says the program has made him appreciate music even more and gives him an advantage for the future.

“The certificate has opened my perspective on how the business of hip-hop came to be,” Perez says. “Getting to learn about the beginnings of hip-hop and the major impacts it made have made me appreciate it even more. This is such a unique opportunity. It is a great opportunity to diversify your portfolio and make you stand out to employers when looking for post-graduate opportunities.”

Harrison incorporates industry professionals to show students how hip-hop and business connect.

Last semester, Grandmaster Caz, who has influenced artists such as Jay-Z, LL Cool J and Will Smith, spoke to UCF students for the third time. Most recently, his visit focused on the role of innovation, entrepreneurship and creativity in his career, as well as a rap tutorial for those in attendance.

This August hip-hop celebrates its 50^th anniversary. In preparation, Harrison is planning a number of special guests and moments for students to celebrate the last half-century at the intersection of music and business. Grandmaster Caz, Fat Joe, DJ Khaled, MC Serch, Adler and Saunders have all been invited back to speak. Photographer Johnny Nunezwill talk with students about his career shooting some of the industry’s biggest names, including Jay-Z, NAS, Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, Beyonce, Drake, Justin Bieber and LeBron James.

The Faculty

UCF faculty members Scott Bukstein, associate lecturer in the undergraduate sport business management program, and Cameron Ford, associate professor of management and founding director of UCF’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, lend their talents to the curriculum as well as lecturers from African and African American Studies, who contribute to a course on the evolution of hip-hop. Harrison has also enlisted help from outside the university from Adler, Brandon Martin, Tuma Basa and Saunders, who all work in and around the entertainment industry. Martin serves as the athletic director of University of Missouri-Kansas City; Basa is the director of Black Music & Culture at YouTube. Basa was also the certificate’s first guest lecturer back in 2019.

UCF’s Center for Research and Education in Arts, Technology and Entertainment (CREATE) also has been an integral part of the certificate, providing both students and faculty. CREATE director Stella Sung and adjunct research animation instructor Ronald Hargrove helped Harrison create visual content for the certificate.

‘The Napkin’

This summer Harrison will release The Napkin: An Annual Report on HipHop Academic Programs online on Aug. 11. Started by Harrison, The Napkin will focus on content that highlights positive world news in hip-hop and higher education curriculum related to the genre. Contributors to The Napkin include recent UCF grad and ESPN+ sideline reporter Hannah Jo Groves ’22, current radio/television student Joshua Hammer and Adler. Groves graduated from ĹŽĆÍAV in 2022 with a journalism major and sport business management minor.

Thanks to the forward-thinking professors, guest lecturers and students, UCF’s Business of HipHop and Creative Industries certificate is primed to stick around as long as hip-hop has with the culture’s tradition of innovation and reinvention. As Caz said, “Hip-hop didn’t invent anything, it reinvented everything.”

What often gets overlooked by some, however, is the value this demographic adds to many stakeholders, most importantly the student academic and professional-development experience. But there are many important investments that adjuncts bring to higher education.

The bottom line is that adjunct faculty from the corporate real world help us bridge theory and practice in a very important way.

Adjuncts from industry are subject-matter experts of best practices. While theory drives practice, practice brings life and experience to theoretical frameworks that too often sit in peer review journals gathering dust on shelves.

Practitioners have lived the workforce realities that students eagerly seek to learn about and apply to their future opportunities as they pay their dues and eventually move up the career ladder.

Adjuncts also have the opportunity to recommend and hire our students for internships via the classroom access and interaction with today’s college students.

Knowledge for knowledge sake is great in theory but in terms of practice, college students usually come to campus to ultimately graduate and land a job.

Adjuncts from the industry create this synergy which is a win/win.

Finally, adjuncts facilitate experiential learning in terms of real-world experience projects, case studies from benchmarks during their career wins, and access to their organizational network during on-site visits to their locations. Just in Florida alone this has included students and faculty spending a day or more at the Orlando Magic, NASCAR, Orlando City Soccer, EA Sports and many others from Tampa to Miami to Jacksonville.

Industry adjuncts give us access and this leads to success.

The following illustrates some collaborative efforts between the industry and higher education with adjuncts and full-time faculty on various campuses across the United States. This snapshot shows the great impact hiring and collaborating with the industry adjuncts can have on our students and the curriculum.

Classes with Master Teachers Part 1: Team Teaching.

• Actress and entrepreneur Tyra Banks and Professor Alison Kugler (Stanford), “Personal Branding”
• Artist Bun B (UGK) with Professor Anthony Pinn (Rice University), “Religion and HipHop Culture”
• Artist T.I. with Professor Melva K. Williams (Clark Atlanta University), “The Business of Trap Music”
• Reggie Saunders (Jordan Brand) and Professor C. Keith Harrison (UCF) “The Role of Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Sport and Entertainment”

Classes with Master Teachers Part 2: Solo.  

• Jay Riola (senior executive at the Orlando Magic) teaches our DeVos graduate course on sport data analytics.
• Jemele Hill (entrepreneur and writer) taught our undergraduate sport business media and technology course three times from 2012 to 2014.
• Guest speakers with experience teaching at UCF that I am working on becoming adjuncts either solo or to team teach all senior executives: Troy Vincent (NFL), Laura Gentile (ESPN), and Howard Wright (technology executive).

All three of these outstanding leaders are also former college athletes at the University of Wisconsin, Duke University, and Stanford University. We want the best in front of our UCF students.

In the final analysis, adjuncts matter and will always be needed. There are also many faculty who pay their dues by starting out as an adjunct. Professor Scott Bukstein started this way, and 12 years after beginning, he is an associate instructor and director of UCF’s sport business management undergraduate program.

I also started as an adjunct many years ago and respect adjuncts to the fullest and the value they bring to the intellectual table.

They are an important factor. Our X factor.

C. Keith Harrison is a professor in the UCF College of Business and the chief academic officer of the DeVos Sport Business Program. He can be reached at Carlton.Harrison@ucf.edu.

The UCF Forum is a weekly series of opinion columns from faculty, staff and students who serve on a panel for a year. A new column is posted each Wednesday on UCF Today and then broadcast on WUCF-FM (89.9) between 7:50 and 8 a.m. Sunday. Opinions expressed are those of the columnists, and are not necessarily shared by the ĹŽĆÍAV.

Jeff and I had a routine during our middle school days in the early 80s. After we raced to the crib on our Schwinn bicycles, we did our homework and then played video games (football was the game of choice), and our favorite pastime was putting on the Sugar Hill Gang’s Rapper’s Delight.

My love for hip-hop, in part, is because it brings people together, something that America desperately needs at this time. In terms of the cool factor, few things are cooler than hip-hop music, culture, fashion and knowledge when the lyrics are conscious and irreverent. “It was all a dream, I used to read Word Up! Magazine,” the late Notorious BIG smoothly spit in his opening verse of Juicy. It still ranks as one of the best songs of all time.

Since hip-hop hit the scene in the 1970s, its popularity has exploded exponentially.

Hip-hop has been the No. 1 musical genre in the world since 2018, bumping the long-time king rock ’n roll off the throne, according to Nielsen Music’s report.

On a macro level, sports and hip-hop are intertwined and the cultural formation at virtually every major sporting event. Corporate sponsors maximize grabbing our attention with hip-hop energy, slang and rap verses. Hip-hop culture connects with youth, young adults and mature adults globally. At least 60 percent of the genre is purchased by male, white Americans, indicating the mainstream consumption of the culture.

One of the best aspects of my job is connecting with others through our shared love and passion for hip-hop. During my time last semester in the Nasir Jones HipHop Fellowship at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, I had the opportunity to virtually sit in a hip-hop course taught by director of the HipHop Archive and Research Institute, Professor Marcyliena Morgan, and famous producer 9^th Wonder. I spent time with UCF alumnus and Boston Celtics center Tacko Fall ’19 and discussed hip-hop while at dinner in Harvard Square in Cambridge. I called Bill Adler, founding director of publicity at Def Jam Records, while at a record store he recommended near campus, as I purchased several vinyl records from the old school days of the culture I love so dearly.

I have enjoyed having a career that has allowed me the gift of parlaying a childhood passion to my job as a professor of business, hip-hop and sport. Hip-hop is a cultural tool that enables my students to learn innovation, entrepreneurship, strategy, risk-taking, marketing, sales, analytics and so much more. Pedagogically, the world exposes today’s students to hip-hop across social media, music in coffee shops, products in various genres, and the consistent tie-in with sport and sport business management.

The rainbow of my hip-hop journey occurred Nov. 20. This is the day UCF officially approved the Business of HipHop Innovation and Creative Industries certificate. We are the first College of Business to offer this type of academic program and it was truly a team effort.

And just like so many other times in my life, a hip-hop lyric provided the perfect sentiment to capture exactly what I felt in that moment: “Just throw your hands up in the air and party hardy like you just don’t care.”

C. Keith Harrison is a professor of business/hip-hop and sport in the UCF College of Business and the chief academic officer of the DeVos Sport Business Program. He can be reached at Carlton.Harrison@ucf.edu.

The UCF Forum is a weekly series of opinion columns from faculty, staff and students who serve on a panel for a year. A new column is posted each Wednesday on UCF Today and then broadcast on WUCF-FM (89.9) between 7:50 and 8 a.m. Sunday. Opinions expressed are those of the columnists, and are not necessarily shared by the ĹŽĆÍAV.

I do not assess today’s changes as better or worse, just different. Society changes, generations evolve, and higher education looks like something else than it did a quarter of a century ago.

My goal has always been the same, with one question: How do I challenge today’s student to be prepared for a competitive and sometimes harsh world that lays people off and even fires employees for underperforming and/or not having an indispensable skill set that an organization values enough to keep one on at the job?

Here is a list of some things that we do in the sport business management minor program to hold our students accountable and hopefully prepare them to thrive for excellence in their future careers.

Reading. Fifty percent of students in higher education do not purchase required books for class, which is alarming. Further, the average American citizen reads up to only one book a year after graduating from college. The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go. That is not taken from Dr. Seuss; however, it is the same message. Feeding your brain and applying the information that you read to life is key.

Show up on time, be present and ready to engage at a high level. We require that our students be on time at the start of class and after the break halfway through class. We do this so that our students build habits of being a professional. Personally, I learned this value not only in my home but at UCLA Coach John Wooden’s basketball camp many years ago in La Jolla, California. Wooden stressed being on time at the camp and to be quick, but do not hurry.

Detach and maximize social media. Social media has allowed all of us to connect with so much content and other humans across the globe. However, social media has also become a major distraction to focusing, quietly studying, and critically thinking about various social, political, educational, etc. issues in society. We require that students keep their phones put up during class and the result is that more human interaction takes place in courses and that our students build more high-quality relationships with their peers, get to know one another, and even know each other’s first and last names in class. Our classrooms should be a place for community building after all, right?

Parental boundaries and respecting authority. We often have to remind students that due to FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act) that we can’t speak with parents about their children’s academic issues. Of course, there are exceptions to speaking with parents, but what we most enjoy is when parents visit our classrooms and observe the great learning environment that our students help us create. We also mentor our students that being autonomous and solving as many challenges that they can on their own will help them navigate the real workplace that awaits them soon after graduation. This is a much better approach than going over a faculty’s rank and running to the dean’s office with parents calling because of falling short with grades or not managing expectations while at the university.

In the final analysis we have many stories of students that grew by allowing themselves to embrace the mentoring and coaching that our team of full-time and adjunct faculty passionately displays. Empowering students over the years with non-cognitive attributes has helped many of them succeed and all of our students can embrace the “little things” that mean a lot. Body language, thank you notes to guest speakers that visit our classrooms, and dressing for success build habits that last a lifetime.

We in no way want to contribute to anxiety that students might have as we are empathetic about the realities of stress and mental health. Our goal is not to trigger but to enable our students to grow through accountability versus avoidance or entitlement. Go Knights!

Keith Harrison is a professor of business/hip-hop and sport in the UCF College of Business and the chief academic officer of the DeVos Sport Business Program. He can be reached at Carlton.Harrison@ucf.edu.

The UCF Forum is a weekly series of opinion columns from faculty, staff and students who serve on a panel for a year. A new column is posted each Wednesday on UCF Today and then broadcast on WUCF-FM (89.9) between 7:50 and 8 a.m. Sunday. Opinions expressed are those of the columnists, and are not necessarily shared by the ĹŽĆÍAV.