Promoting Employability through Entrepreneurial Actions in Cross-Border Student Enterprises Erasmus Project

Project Title

Promoting Employability through Entrepreneurial Actions in Cross-Border Student
Enterprises

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2015

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Entrepreneurial learning – entrepreneurship education; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

Background: In the participating partner countries (IT and ES) the options for young people are limited to take part in initial vocational training or to gain work experience. Even though youth unemployment is low in Germany, problems exist in the transition from school to work (transition system) or occur later on (drop-outs in initial vocational training). Preventive approaches, which are settled in schools, are necessary. Following the European Commission, school enterprises are “the most worthwhile investment” in this regard. School enterprises, however, operate mostly locally, and rarely regionally or nationally, and until now not cross-borderly. This is starting point of the project.

Objectives: The project aims at the development and implementation of cross-border school enterprises in the fields of tourism and recreation, where economic action is embedded in pedagogical goal setting. The students are involved in real economic processes, actively participate in their school enterprise (SE), learn from each other across national borders, share their “best practices”, and act as consultants to other students. They invent new products together, test them on the market, and continuously analyze and reflect on their actions. Learning takes place in the work process in an action-oriented way. Theory and practical experiences are interconnected and enable the development of reflected entrepreneurial competence.

Consortium: The consortium consists of 7 institutions from three countries (DE, ES, IT). In each country, at least one school is involved in the project. Each school is accompanied by a promoter. The promoters come from different areas, according to the respective requirements in the countries (University, National Institute, Training Agency, Consultancy).

Activities: All products (5 in total) are divided into activities for the product development (preparation, implementation and optimization) and bundled activities for the product dissemination. The activities are designed to develop methodology and guidelines (manual for establishment and operation of cross-border operating school enterprises), building up service and structure (communication structures between SEs), learning and teaching/training materials (peer-to-peer-learning, teacher training) and the dissemination and implementation of the results of these activities (9 events for multipliers, certificate).

Realization: The products (see results and impact) are jointly developed within the consortium. For each product one of the project partners takes over the responsibility/leadership. The product development is controlled by the project management by bringing together product-kick-off and project meeting. For continuous quality development both, a formative project evaluation with a meta-evaluation of the products and a summative final evaluation as impact analysis are planned.

Results: A group of cross-border school enterprises is implemented as a model for other interested school enterprises in Europe. The procedure for the establishment and operation is documented in a manual. The manual and all other developed materials (teacher training concept, peer-to-peer learning concept, concept for communication in cross-border operating school enterprises/web-based work in groups) are permanently available on a web portal in order both to provide information about the approach and to promote networking between school enterprises in Europe. The established group offers assistance for those interested by promoting the collaboration of existing and newly to be founded groups in this field.

Impact and benefits: 15% to 20% of students participating in a school enterprise project start their own business later on. This proportion is three to five times higher than within the general population. With the project approach not only entrepreneurial competence is promoted, but also the cross-border establishment of operating-enterprises. Furthermore, skills are developed which improve the employability of young people (such as initiative of one’s own, ability to work in a team and sense of responsibility). In joint work the students also develop linguistic and information technology skills which enhance their opportunities for work mobility within Europe. The certificate will allow to certify these skills acquired informally, with which the certificate (1) is a form of feedback, and thus helps reflexively to strengthen the skills development and (2) provides a framework to ensure that the skills acquired are “marketable”.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 211131 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIVERSITAET BREMEN & Country: DE

Project Partners

• SZ Bürgermeister Smidt / Kaufmännische Lehranstalten
• ITURBROK S.L.
• Landesinstitut für Schule
• Training 2000 psc
• ISTITUTO D’ISTRUZIONE SUPERIORE POLO 3
• Centro Integrado Burlada FP