School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 1 The challenges of entrepreneurship education at university: Evidence from a longitudinal survey Chaoyang University of Technology Professor D.J. Visser, Ph.D. Professor of Management School of Business and Finance University of the Western Cape Bellville South Africa

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 2 Introduction Entrepreneurship education at university Lack of employment opportunities Introduction of course at 2 nd year level Purpose of this paper  Design of an innovative module  Practical implementation  Assessing efficacy by means of longitudinal survey

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 3 Literature review on entrepreneurship education Laukannen (2000) Education about entrepreneurship Education for entrepreneurship Mason (2000) Developing cores skills & attributes Literature supports: Entrepreneurship can be taught (Timmons & Spinelli, 2004) Education can enhance entrepreneurial skills, competencies, attitudes (Davies, 2001)

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 4 Hytti’s Model of Entrepreneurship Education Learn to understand entrepreneurship Learn to become more entrepreneurial Learn to become an entrepreneur What do entrepreneurs do? What is entrepreneurship? Why are entrepreneurs needed? How many entrepreneurs do we have? I need to take responsibility of my learning, career and life How do I take responsibility? Can I become an entrepreneur? How to become an entrepreneur? How to manage the business?

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 5 Measuring entrepreneurship at tertiary level Entrepreneurial Attitude Orientation scale (validated by Robinson, Stimpson, Huefner & Hunt, 1991) Specifically designed to measure “attitude” Successfully discriminates between entrepreneurs & non-entrepreneurs EAO subscales: Achievement in Business (ACH) Innovation in Business (INN) Personal Control (PC) Self-esteem (SE) All 4 subscales validated for South Africa (Van Wyk, Boshoff and Owen, 1999)

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 6 Hypotheses H1:Achievement orientation improves after having attended the training module H2:Personal control improves after having attended the training module H3:Innovation improves after having attended the training module H4:Self-esteem improves after having attended the training module

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 7 Academic programme for entrepreneurship at second year level Term 1: Starting a business (Theory) Entrepreneurship as a career choice, theory on starting and running an enterprise Term 2: Starting a business (Practice) Group involvement, forming micro-enterprise teams Term 3: Operating the small business (Practice) Running enterprises, experiencing success factors Term 4: Harvesting the enterprise (Practice) Group dynamics, conflict resolution

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 8 Assessment methods Weekly journals Student peer evaluation Interview/interaction with entrepreneurs Group business plan Action training Group enterprise progress reports Case studies Term tests Final group report Examination

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 9 Research method: Longitudinal survey Design of study T1: Pre-test T2: Post-test Experimental group and Control group subjected to same tests

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 10 Student profiles in terms of sex FrequencyPercent Experimental Group Male Female Total Missing System Total Control Male Female No other Total

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 11 Paired samples – statistical comparison between T1 and T2 MeanNStd. Deviation Std. Error Mean Experimental Group Pair 1 achav1 achav2 Pair 2 inovav 1 inovav 2 Pair 3 cntlav1 cntlav2 Pair 4 slfav1 slfav Control Group Pair 1 achav1 achav2 Pair 2 inovav 1 inovav 2 Pair 3 cntlav1 cntlav2 Pair 4 slfav1 slfav

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 12 Paired samples Test T1-T2 TdfSig.(2-tailed) Experimental Group Pair 1 achav1 & achav2 Pair 2 inovav1 & inovav2 Pair 3 cntlav1 & cntlav2 Pair 4 slfav1 & slfav **.006** Control Group Pair 1 achav1 & achav2 Pair 2 inovav1 & inovav2 Pair 3 cntlav1 & cntlav2 Pair 4 slfav1 & slfav * * p < 0.05 ** p < 0.01 Comparison between training group and control group after training SourceDfMean SquareFSig. Achievement Control Innovation Self-esteem

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 13 Confirming the hypotheses (1) H1:Achievement orientation improves after having attended the training module. The training had a significant positive effect on Achievement. The trained students showed a significantly higher score in the post training measure than the control group H2:Personal control improves after having attended the training module. Hypothesis 2 could not be confirmed. Students with a high score of external control believe that the situation is mainly determined by external forces.

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 14 H3:Innovation improves after having attended the training module The results show that students increased their innovation score significantly between T1 and T2 as well as in comparison to a control group H4:Self-esteem improves after having attended the training module. At the end of the academic year the self-esteem of the training group was significantly higher than that of the control group. Confirming the hypotheses (2)

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 15 Summary of the elements of assessment and score values (N=85) Learning objectivesEfficacy of lecturersAssessing the module HighMediumLowHighMediumLowHighMediumLow 74.1%14.2%11.7%82.5%10.3%7.2%86.0%11.8%2.2% 9 Questions13 Questions8 Questions

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 16 Conclusions Changing the mindsets of students by offering self- employment (i.e. entrepreneurship) as a viable alternative to becoming a job-seeker; Presenting students with the necessary business skills to start and run an enterprise; Facilitating and further enhancing experiential learning by running and managing their own enterprises on campus; Subjecting students to real-life examples of the typical problems, needs and constraints entrepreneurs face; and, Developing role models based on the successful examples of similar student enterprises from previous years.

School of Business and Finance Prof. D.J. Visser, Ph.D. 17 Recommendations Future training: “hands-on” Length of training courses Longer training time period impacts positively on the outcome Replication at other tertiary institutions