Matthew C. Draycott, David Rae and Katie Vause
Although the assessment of enterprise education activities has been widely highlighted as a key area of concern, it continues to be under represented in the literature. Questions…
Abstract
Purpose
Although the assessment of enterprise education activities has been widely highlighted as a key area of concern, it continues to be under represented in the literature. Questions remain as to how educators seeking to monitor student progression can capture quality data and measure relevant aspects of development, often leading enterprise education to be monitored rather than assessed. This article seeks to explore the challenges of assessing enterprise education in the secondary education sector. It aims to provide useful insights to help practitioners understand how to evidence the impact of enterprise learning by students.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper first presents a critical review of the existing literature with insights from specialist practitioners sourced through an online survey and a seminar. This provides a broad review of the field from a practitioner standpoint focusing on current assessment techniques and standards. Using these data a conceptual pedagogy is proposed for the delivery of enterprise education and a methodology for its assessment, to be developed in future work.
Findings
A critical review of the assessment of enterprise education is presented. This exposes challenges of a confused field, with pockets of good practice in schools often not shared or understood out of context. The development of a novel pedagogical model for teaching enterprise education is proposed, linked to a prototype assessment methodology which presents a new approach for enterprise teaching and learning.
Research limitations/implications
The work is limited at this stage since participants in the research were drawn from one geographic area in the East of England, and examples of qualifications reviewed were not exhaustive, but these limitations can be addressed in future research.
Practical implications
The paper provides a conceptual model for structuring enterprise education which may have relevance across the secondary sector and beyond.
Originality/value
The article investigates the problems of assessing enterprise in secondary education, examining what does and does not work, and providing practitioners with useful guidance. In this important topic it is vital that new approaches are developed which can create a broader debate especially at a time of such great change in the educational landscape. This paper provides a platform for further development in the field.
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Kelly Smith, Matthew Charles Rogers-Draycott and David Bozward
Full curriculum-based Venture Creation Programmes (VCPs) are a relatively new and potentially underutilised form of degree programme in which students explore the on-going…
Abstract
Purpose
Full curriculum-based Venture Creation Programmes (VCPs) are a relatively new and potentially underutilised form of degree programme in which students explore the on-going creation of a new venture as a primary aspect of their formal study. The highly experiential nature of VCPs has the potential to meet the calls of researchers and policymakers for students to actively participate in and control their own learning for enterprise and entrepreneurship. However, research into VCP's remains limited which constrains their development. The purpose of this paper is, therefore, to review the literature surrounding VCPs in order to investigate the current research and explore areas for further study to support the development of these courses.
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic literature review was conducted in order to find and explore literature around VCPs, defined here as credit-bearing whole programmes of study, focused on learning for entrepreneurship, with the creation of a real-life business venture as an integral part of the learning experience, on which completion of the programme is dependent. First, academic literature published in peer-reviewed journals was collected through a systematic search. In parallel with this, academic colleagues working in this space were contacted for recommendations of literature and for information on work in progress. This led to additional emerging work being discovered that is primarily being presented at conferences. A further general Internet search was conducted to find non-academic information, reports and literature relating to VCP practice.
Findings
Four themes were explored covering the entire student journey (1) application and recruitment; (2) teaching, learning and assessment; (3) development of entrepreneurial identity; and (4) entrepreneurial outcomes. The literature presented in the paper suggests that VCPs can meet calls to provide an innovative curriculum based on experiential learning principles. VCPs can provide a positive learning experience in addition to leading to actual business start-up during the degree or after graduation.
Originality/value
This paper presents a comprehensive review of literature focusing on VCPs. Recommendations are made for further research. A key question remains: if full VCPs have the potential to enhance learning, produce positive business outcomes, and address policy calls, why are there so few known VCPs at universities around the world?
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Matthew Draycott and David Rae
The period 2002‐2010 has seen significant growth in enterprise education in schools in England, accompanied by the growth of guidelines and frameworks to provide educational and…
Abstract
Purpose
The period 2002‐2010 has seen significant growth in enterprise education in schools in England, accompanied by the growth of guidelines and frameworks to provide educational and assessment structures. This paper intends to explore the questions: What does “enterprise” mean in the context of 14‐19 education? What is the purpose and contribution of competence frameworks and related structures for the learning and assessment of enterprise education? How effective are they? and How might enterprise education frameworks evolve in response to changes in the post‐ recessionary economic, employment and educational landscape?
Design/methodology/approach
The paper conducts a critical review of competency frameworks introduced in England to assist with enterprise education primarily for the 14‐19 age group. These are compared on the basis of their educational purpose and rationale (“why?”), their content (“what skills and knowledge they include”), and the approaches to teaching, learning and assessment they recommend (“how?”).
Findings
The analysis discusses the following questions to reflect on the progress and direction of enterprise education: How broadly or narrowly should enterprise be defined? How useful is the term? Are the skills and related knowledge and attributes too broad or too soft?; and Is there too much emphasis on assessable outcomes, rather than on how enterprising learning takes place?
Practical implications
The paper contributes to the development of enterprise education for researchers, policymakers and practitioners in schools at an important point in the economic, educational and political cycle.
Originality/value
Enterprise education in schools requires critique of and reflection on what has been achieved, together with consideration of its future purpose, value, orientation and nature. There is a concern that the “delivery” of enterprise education takes place in ways which are not “enterprising” forms of learning, and that assessment drives the curriculum. Changes to definitions, frameworks and pedagogy are needed to clarify its future educational role.
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Despite over two decades of crack use in the UK, there is little UK‐focused research and little understanding of the social context of crack use and health‐related risks. This is…
Abstract
Despite over two decades of crack use in the UK, there is little UK‐focused research and little understanding of the social context of crack use and health‐related risks. This is of concern because research in the UK suggests that service provision for crack users is inadequate. Research also suggests that there are high attrition rates of crack users in drug support services. Based on data collected in 2004/2005, this paper will examine how crack cocaine users start using crack, what happens over time, and where they end up as a consequence ‐ the crack scene. Many become mistrustful because of the manipulative and violent interactions that take place in these spaces. This is not helped when crack users reflect on past mistakes, which only results in increased crack use. As practical and health issues become too problematic, ways out, too, become more difficult. In addition, many find it difficult to place trust in welfare and drug support services because of negative past experiences, and feel ashamed about past failures in treatment. Taken together, I will also show how this is not helped by the configuration of drug support services.
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It has often been said that a great part of the strength of Aslib lies in the fact that it brings together those whose experience has been gained in many widely differing fields…
Abstract
It has often been said that a great part of the strength of Aslib lies in the fact that it brings together those whose experience has been gained in many widely differing fields but who have a common interest in the means by which information may be collected and disseminated to the greatest advantage. Lists of its members have, therefore, a more than ordinary value since they present, in miniature, a cross‐section of institutions and individuals who share this special interest.
Earliest localism was sited on a tree or hill or ford, crossroads or whenceways, where people assembled to talk, (Sax. witan), or trade, (Sax. staple), in eggs, fowl, fish or…
Abstract
Earliest localism was sited on a tree or hill or ford, crossroads or whenceways, where people assembled to talk, (Sax. witan), or trade, (Sax. staple), in eggs, fowl, fish or faggots. From such primitive beginnings many a great city has grown. Settlements and society brought changes; appointed headmen and officials, a cloak of legality, uplifted hands holding “men to witness”. Institutions tend to decay and many of these early forms passed away, but not the principle vital to the system. The parish an ecclesiastical institution, had no place until Saxons, originally heathens, became Christians and time came when Church, cottage and inn filled the lives of men, a state of localism in affairs which endured for centuries. The feudal system decayed and the vestry became the seat of local government. The novels of Thomas Hardy—and English literature boasts of no finer descriptions of life as it once was—depict this authority and the awe in which his smocked countrymen stood of “the vicar in his vestry”. The plague freed serfs and bondsmen, but events, such as the Poor Law of 1601, if anything, revived the parish as the organ of local government, but gradually secular and ecclesiastical aspects were divided and the great population explosion of the eighteenth century created necessity for subdivision of areas, which continued to serve the principle of localism however. The ballot box completed the eclipse of Church; it changed concepts of localism but not its importance in government.
The Food Bill has emerged from the Grand Committee on Trade, and will shortly be submitted, as amended, to the House of Commons. Whatever further amendments may be introduced, the…
Abstract
The Food Bill has emerged from the Grand Committee on Trade, and will shortly be submitted, as amended, to the House of Commons. Whatever further amendments may be introduced, the Bill, when passed into law, will but afford one more example of the impotence of repressive legislation in regard to the production and distribution of adulterated and inferior products. We do not say that the making of such laws and their enforcement are not of the highest importance in the interests of the community; their administration—feeble and inadequate as it must necessarily be—produces a valuable deterrent effect, and tends to educate public opinion and to improve commercial morality. But we say that by the very nature of those laws their working can result only in the exposure of a small portion of that which is bad without affording any indications as to that which is good, and that it is by the Control System alone that the problem can be solved. This fact has been recognised abroad, and is rapidly being recognised here. The system of Permanent Analytical Control was under discussion at the International Congress of Applied Chemistry, held at Brussels in 1894, and at the International Congress of Hygiene at Budapest in 1895, and the facts and explanations put forward have resulted in the introduction of the system into various countries. The establishment of this system in any country must be regarded as the most practical and effective method of ensuring the supply of good and genuine articles, and affords the only means through which public confidence can be ensured.
Ana Junça-Silva, Henrique Duarte and Susana C. Santos
Discovering opportunities is a key entrepreneurship competence for those who want to start their own business and who choose to enter the workforce. In this study, the authors…
Abstract
Purpose
Discovering opportunities is a key entrepreneurship competence for those who want to start their own business and who choose to enter the workforce. In this study, the authors focus on the antecedents of the ability to discover entrepreneurial opportunities by uncovering how and when students' personal initiative (Frese and Fay, 2001) leads to an increase in this key competency. The purpose of this study was to examine the role of risk-taking and creativity in the interplay between personal initiative and opportunity discovery competencies among university students.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected with a self-assessment tool in two moments in time, using a sample of 103 university students from Portugal enrolled in an entrepreneurship course. The authors measured personal initiative and entrepreneurial risk-taking at the beginning of the entrepreneurship course (Time 1). Two months later (Time 2), by the end of an entrepreneurship course, the authors measured creativity and opportunity discovery abilities.
Findings
The results of this study showed that risk-taking mediates the effect of personal initiative on opportunity discovery and that creativity interacts with risk-taking and opportunity discovery. Specifically, the authors found that the relationship between entrepreneurial risk-taking and opportunity discovery is positive and statistically significant when students display average or above-average creativity. The indirect effect of the personal initiative on opportunity discovery through entrepreneurial risk-taking seems to increase when the student's creativity increases, as the index of moderated mediation is positive.
Research limitations/implications
As with all studies, there are limitations to work of this study. First, data of this study is restricted to a sample of students from Portugal. As such, the authors should be careful about generalizations concerning students from other cultural settings; entrepreneurship competencies can differ across countries. Second, the findings of the present study are based on students’ self-reports regarding their own entrepreneurship competencies.
Originality/value
This work can inspire entrepreneurship educators to look at the entrepreneurship competencies models holistically and inspire future work to explore the relationship patterns between entrepreneurial competencies.
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The purpose of this paper is to investigate implementation of enterprise education (EE) through experiential learning, and its relevance to pharmacy education in the UK Higher…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate implementation of enterprise education (EE) through experiential learning, and its relevance to pharmacy education in the UK Higher Education Institutions.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper characterises the state of pharmacy EE using Fayolle’s (2013) generic teaching model in EE and Kolb’s (1984) experiential learning theory as underlying conceptual and theoretical frameworks. The paper focuses on how EE takes place through approaches employed within experiential learning to develop graduates’ enterprise skills, and investigate the challenges faced within institutional contexts. The paper draws on qualitative empirical approach using the social constructionist paradigm to investigate experiences of pharmacy academics.
Findings
The study identifies four Aspects of Experiential Learning in the context of EE (AELEE), which extend both Fayolle’s and Kolb’s frameworks.
Research limitations/implications
The research focuses solely on views of academics in UK pharmacy schools, and is of qualitative nature. This could limit the generalisability of results, yet also offer deeper sector-specific insight into EE.
Practical implications
Findings provide insights into the difficulty of positioning EE in non-business schools and the hurdles academics face. Findings are expected to encourage enterprise educators to design EE programmes that consider the institutional context.
Originality/value
The research makes a significant contribution to existing EE literature with its non-business sector specificity and its focus on academics. Hence, the study responds to Fayolle’s (2013) call for more research into EE with focus on the educator, and deeper connections between EE and education literature.
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Deema Refai, Rita G. Klapper and John Thompson
Drawing on the Gestalt approach the purpose of this paper is to propose a holistic framework for enterprise education (EE) research based on Social Constructionism, illustrating…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on the Gestalt approach the purpose of this paper is to propose a holistic framework for enterprise education (EE) research based on Social Constructionism, illustrating how the latter supports research into experiential learning in EE in seven UK Higher Education (HE) pharmacy schools.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper is based on a qualitative empirical study involving educators in UK Higher Education Institution pharmacy schools in semi-structured interviews, and investigates the delivery of EE through experiential learning approaches. Social Constructionism is proposed as a suitable underlying philosophical paradigm.
Findings
A Social Constructionism paradigm, which adopts relative realism ontology, transactional epistemology, and Gadamer’s hermeneutic phenomenology, offers a relevant, multi-perspectival philosophical foundation for EE research, supporting transactional relationships within contexts of multiple possibilities.
Research limitations/implications
Social Constructionism does not necessarily support the individualistic paradigm, as advocated by constructivists; and the values associated with the former encourage a more collaborative and cooperative approach different from the latter.
Practical implications
The paper supports the understanding that applying experiential learning through inter-disciplinary and inter-professional learning is regarded as an approach beneficial for educators, institutions and learners, within the context of EE.
Originality/value
This paper offers a holistic conceptual framework of Social Constructionism that draws on the “Gestalt Approach”, and highlights the harmony between the ontological, epistemological and methodological underpinnings of Social Constructionism. The paper demonstrates the relevance of the proposed framework in EE research within the context of an empirical study, which is different in that it focuses on the delivery aspect of EE by considering the views of the providers (educators), an hitherto under-researched area.