Create entrepreneurial skills in students

In line with recent educational reforms, higher education institutions are requested to equip students with transversal or soft skills to prepare them better for their later jobs and careers in labour markets beyond academia. Entrepreneurial skills are part of these transversal and soft skills. Recently, the European Skills Agenda has been expanded to domains beyond labour markets. Now, also skills that support the green deal, are relevant for nurturing social inclusion and make individuals and societies more resilient in reacting to crisis.

Foremost, entrepreneurship education aims at creating skills in students that increases their later employability and supports them in developing an entrepreneurial mindset.

The Entrecomp Framework helps higher education institutions in identifying relevant entrepreneurial competencies and defining learning outcomes. Entrecomp distinguishes three main areas with five specific competencies:

• The area ‘ideas and opportunities’ links to competencies that enable students, to develop, evaluate and select ideas and opportunities (also against ethical and sustainability backgrounds)
• The area ‘resources’ includes competencies to mobilise and use own resources and those of other while considering ethical and sustainability issues
• The area ‘into action’ includes competencies to act upon ideas and realise them through e.g., team work competencies or  planning and management

Integrating entrepreneurship education in higher education teaching and learning can differ substantially with regard to form and scope: Large-scale interventions foremost include the change of the curricula through e.g., the definition of additional learning outcomes. Small-scale interventions include the implementation of (new) didactical methods or tools such as serious games or case studies.