Parts & Parcel of Entrepreneurship Part- XVI

Conclusions

With classroom-based learning more explicitly connected to its real life applica-tions, the evidence so far suggests that students taking part in entrepreneur-ship and enterprise education programmes are rediscovering a reason to learn and a renewed sense of optimism in their future. Furthermore, these programmes are challenging societal beliefs about what we mean by “entrepreneurship” or “entrepreneurial” behavior.

But education and training, no matter how innovative the model of delivery, cannot by themselves solve all of society’s problems related to youth unemployment and poverty. To think so would be to ignore the importance of the wider environ-ment on the life chances and opportunities available to young people in different contexts. But what education can do is increase a young person’s chances for success by awakening his talents, opening up career options and providing a solid set of tools as he travels along his chosen pathway.

With unemployment endemic among youth in many countries and the poten-tial social costs of inter-generational unemployment high, these important principles are taking now a central position across different dimensions of national develop-ment planning and international development cooperation. And, while solutions are individual, there is much to be gained by policy makers and programme managers from hearing and sharing the experience – both the successes and failures – of other countries.

Politicians and education policy-makers are now looking carefully at entre-preneurship and enterprise education as a way of harnessing young people as assets, and making students more ‘realistic’ or ambitious about the world of work and com-munity that lies ahead.

One of the immediate obstacles to overcome will be the hesitancy of educa-tors and teachers. Many will immediately associate entrepreneurship and enterprise education with business, and with values that have proven to have negative impacts on many of the world’s communities. They will also associate such programmes with notions of students being oriented to learning about enterprise and market mechanisms. The wider benefits may not be very clear. But a strong case for entrepre-neurship or enterprise education can be made when the linkages to broader social, cultural and environmental goals are drawn out.