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This module focuses on initiatives and training to stimulate entrepreneurship among students, suggesting ideas to train entrepreneurial teachers, presenting entrepreneurial projects carried out in schools and proposing methods to create a network and to find funds.

Innovative Entrepreneurial Experiences at Schools

Table of Content

Chapter 1: European Context
Implementing the Community Lisbon Programme (2006)
In 2006, the European Commission recommended every Member State to raise awareness among the largest number of people about entrepreneurship learning, especially among young people from primary school to university.

For Europe, willing to protect its social model, it is important to encourage young Europeans to become tomorrow’s entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship is a key competence to develop from the earliest age and education can be decisive.

It is the ability to turn ideas into actions: “an individual’s ability to make ideas concrete, to innovate, to take initiatives and risks, to organise and manage projects in order to achieve objectives.”

In 2006, six recommendations (based on best practices observed in Europe) were expressed so that education take a more active part in the creation of a more entrepreneurial culture in Europe:
  • A consistent framework: national and regional authorities should set up a cooperation between different services to draw up a strategy with clear objectives for all levels of education.
  • Support to schools: schools should benefit from practical support and incentive measures to integrate entrepreneurship in their curricula, this with the help of a set of instruments (diffusion of teaching materials, pilot project funding, best practice dissemination, promotion of partnership with companies, support to organisations specialised in the achievement of entrepreneurship projects with schools, etc.).
  • Support to teachers: teachers receiving initial and continuing training as well as practical experience would be essential.
  • Stimulating entrepreneurship in higher education: entrepreneurship training should be integrated in several subjects, including in the context of scientific and technical studies.
  • Participation of external and entrepreneurial stakeholders: entrepreneurship training should be the object of a close cooperation between education institution and the local community, including enterprises.
  • Practical experiences: learning through practical experience (students creating and managing mini-companies) is one of the most effective way to stimulate entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial competences.

In French-speaking Belgium, for instance, the European recommendations are translated into the Declaration of Community Policy 2009-2014. It mentions that entrepreneurship needs to become a strategic priority of education.

Entrepreneurship “must be understood as the ability to tart a project, this project could be part of an economic, social or cultural context”. It must be encouraged at all levels of education.

Concretely, the government declaration foresaw that “every student will participate in an entrepreneurship awareness activity during the second and third level of secondary school…”, and also to “integrate in every vocational school project a component aiming to develop innovation, creation and entrepreneurship abilities”.

Currently, the concept has taken a larger meaning making reference to “transversal skills”, as it is underlined in “Esprit d’entreprendre, es-tu là ?” published in 2012 in the education magazine “PROF”.

At all levels of education should be implemented educational methods that develop entrepreneurial abilities: creativity, confidence, perseverance, sense of responsibilities, team spirit. In brief, competences that go beyond the economic and commercial sectors, that student will be able to apply in a professional context and in all aspects of their life as citizens.
Online Resources

Table of Content

Comments on this section

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Date: 2016.08.03

Posted by S. Cabrerizo - Spain

The e-learning guide is very useful. Module 4, Innovative Entrepreneurial Experiences at Schools, provides easy examples for teachers.
The negative side is is that there is a lot of information in English, and sometimes it is difficult to follow it if you have an intermediate level of English. Moreover, as a suggestion, I think it could be a good idea to have it in a download version to print the most interesting parts.

Date: 2016.07.07

Posted by Didier Cahour - France

This module is a little bit complex and theoretical. Good practices at the end are relevant.

Date: 2016.07.06

Posted by Gabriela Vrabie - Romania

This module highlights a very important aspect of education: entrepreneurship education in schools, vocational schools and universities, which will definitely have a positive impact on entrepreneurial dynamism in our economies, on young people’s employability.
To this end it not only raises teachers and counsellors’ awareness about the benefits of enterprise projects but also provides them with invaluable tips on how to implement such enterprise projects at their own school. Teachers and counsellors will find practical advice on the necessary steps in creating an enterprise project at school, how an enterprise works or how to search for funds such as crowdfunding. The module also proposes teachers, educators or guidance counsellors a series of best practices to get inspired from.

Date: 2016.07.05

Posted by Martine Prignon (AEDE-EL) - Belgium

The choice of topics and the study of them provide a valuable source of information to teachers, trainers, counselors...
The best practices and online resources add a useful complement to theory, by presenting concrete examples of experiences, projects, exchanges between peers...

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This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This web site reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.