"Give me more!" says the Council05 May 2015
It is a European goal that every young person should have a practical entrepreneurial experience before they leave school. Teachers should be confident in their teaching and well equipped for delivering the entrepreneurship education curriculum and the business community fully involved.
The European Council underlined in their meeting in December 2014 the importance of developing entrepreneurial skills from an early age and of reinforcing links between the education system and business world, in line with the European Council's call in June, "to promote a climate of entrepreneurship and job creation". Entrepreneurship and education are also priorities of the Europe 2020 strategy. Suggestions for how entrepreneurship education experiences can flow from primary to upper secondary, content/tools/methods that can be used and approaches to teacher training are crucial areas to develop.
"Entrepreneurship education" and "entrepreneurial learning" have thus become major areas of policy development in Europe. How can we encourage more creative thinking, promote a strong sense of self-worth, initiative and a tolerance of failure? How can we help young people develop the skills and mind-set to be able to turn ideas into action? Since 2004, entrepreneurship has been formally included as a key competence for all learners, supporting personal development, active citizenship, social inclusion and work-readiness. It is relevant across the lifelong learning process, in all disciplines of learning and to all forms of education and training (formal, non-formal and informal) which contribute to an entrepreneurial spirit or behaviour, with or without a commercial objective. In the end, it is all about creating value, either in social, cultural or economical context. Development of competence in entrepreneurship must be included as an integrated part of education at all levels.
The Entrepreneurial School is a project worth visiting.