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Guidance supporting Europe’s aspiring entrepreneurs
Policy and practice to harness future potential
The role of guidance in Higher Education
Until recently, entrepreneurship was not considered a ‘sufficiently’ academic topic
to be taught in Higher Education Institutions (HEI), nor were universities
considered the best source of support for individuals who want to start their own
business. However, the research findings demonstrate that HEIs can offer
support to students that enables them to pursue business ventures and also
become more entrepreneurial in their approach to life and work more generally.
The past decade has seen an exponential rise in entrepreneurial learning
opportunities in European HEIs, though coverage remains somewhat patchy.
Particular issues that warrant attention include the following:
• providing access to entrepreneurship learning for all students: more than half
of Europe’s students in higher education have no access to entrepreneurship
education, indicating that there is a massive gap to be filled;
• taking entrepreneurship learning out of business schools, promoting inter-
disciplinary approaches and developing entrepreneurship skills also among
‘hard science’, arts, social science and humanities students;
• understanding how a holistic, institutional approach to entrepreneurship
learning can be established in HEIs as well as transferred to other HEIs.
Formal vs. non-formal guidance services
HEI career guidance services are more active concerning entrepreneurship than
their counterparts in compulsory education and IVET. However, most HEI career
centres are typically more focused on providing information to students about
employment rather than self-employment. While some business support is
available, guidance professionals themselves do not necessarily feel that they
are well-equipped to provide this form of assistance to students.
Guidance for entrepreneurship is more commonly present in Western rather
than Eastern European countries. Significant progress has occurred in the last
two years in many Eastern European HEIs, though financial shortcomings remain
a real problem, accentuated by the economic crisis. Some non-formal guidance
activities are available in most European countries, although the range of
activities and quality of support varies significantly both between and within
countries. European funding has played an important part in enabling many
European countries to invest more in enterprise support.
Integrating enterprise support provision with the career service offer is one
way of mainstreaming entrepreneurship as a career option. The approach means
that career services staff are exposed to expertise in entrepreneurship and
students are informed about available enterprise support and related training.
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