Developing the Spirit of Entrepreneurship in the High School Student

Hutari Putri Widuri

Postgraduate Universitas Negeri Surabaya, East Java, Indonesia

Keywords: Develop, Spirit, Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneurship Education.

Abstract: The issue of graduate employability has been a point of discussion of many years. The high unemployment

because of company to be more selective choose tehir workers. Lately the company is looking for workers

who have a high level of education and life skills, these capabilities should have been developed by every

individual, especially teenagers in high school where they begin to determine the career in the future. Through

entrepreneurship education they will be educated become individuals who have their ability and also develop

entrepreneurship spirit became a tough person and can create their own business. This paper using literature

review methods.

1 INTRODUCTION

Entrepreneurs are not born rather they become

through the experience of their lives. In everyday life,

there are still many people who give their opinions

and views that entrepreneurship is identical to what is

owned and carried out by entrepreneurs or self-

employed. That view is not appropriate because the

entrepreneurial spirit and attitude is not only owned

by entrepreneurs, but also by everyone who thinks

creatively and act innovatively.

Generally, people believe that entrepreneurial

skill can be learned and develop by inculcating

entrepreneurship knowledge to students. Through

effective entrepreneurship education a student can

access the skill and knowledge needed to start and

grow up a new business. According Kuratko and

Hodgets (2004), entrepreneurship is a dynamic

process of vision, change and creation. It requires an

application of energy and passion towards the

creation and implementation of new ideas and

creative solutions.

A high level of entrepreneur’s activity is assumed

and shown to contribute to foster competition,

innovation, economic growth, job creation and well-

being citizens. According to Global Entrepreneurship

Monitor (GEM) (2008), there is wide agreement on

the importance of entrepreneurship for economic

development. Entrepreneurs drive innovation: they

speed up structural changes in the economy and force

old incumbent companies to shape up thereby making

an indirect contribution to productivity.

Various entrepreneurship programmes, fora,

seminars and conferences have been organized to find

solutions to the reasons why youth have not been fully

engaged towards setting up their future venture.

Different countries have invested in various

entrepreneurship programmes in order to see whether

students can exploit untapped business opportunities.

ODI (2012) describes youth entrepreneurial activities

as the process involving individuals who are (or want

to become) self-employed or who have started (or

want to start) a new business, in either the formal or

informal sector, in order to generate income. The

current state of resolving global economic meltdown,

economic crises or recession around the world has

created the need to develop proper entrepreneur

skills/training among youth for proper opportunity

utilisation in order to turn economy capacity towards

more productive youth. Various questions have been

asked among stakeholders on whether youth are ready

to take the mantle of business opportunities around

the world. Utilising the youth readiness towards new

business creation gives an economy comparative

advantage over another.

Many youth of nowadays possess business ideas

but only have the capacity and ability to turn it into

viable businesses. Shane et al (2012) added further

that successful nature of new business start-up

depends on youth readiness to turn their ideas into

business. To develop spirit entrepreneurship,

education seems important for stimulating that

because several reasons (Reynolds, Hay & Camp,

1999). First, education provides individuals with a

sense of autonomy independence and self-

Widuri, H.

Developing the Spirit of Entrepreneurship in the High School Student.

In Proceedings of the 2nd Inter national Conference on Economic Education and Entrepreneurship (ICEEE 2017), pages 321-325

ISBN: 978-989-758-308-7

321

confidence. Second, education makes people aware

of alternative career choices. Third, education

broaden horizons of individuals, thereby making

people better equipped to perceive opportunities, and

finally, education provides knowledge that can be

used by individuals to develop new entrepreneurial

opportunities.

Based on the opinions can be seen that the first

step for student in the high school to develop their

spirit by entrepreneurship education.

2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Entrepreneurship Education

Hansemak (1998) states that traditional education is

marked as only a transformation of knowledge and

abilities, while entrepreneurship education, in

contrast, is held up as the model for changing

attitudes and motives. Entrepreneurship and

entrepreneurship education, beside evident

advantages, like promoting business start-up, has also

a wider market potential (Holmgren et al., 2004).

Entrepreneurship education seeks to propose

people, especially young people, to be responsible, as

well as enterprising individuals who contribute to

economic development and sustainable communities.

According to the European Commission

communication (Fostering entrepreneurial mind-set

through education and learning), entrepreneurship

education can be defined as it follows:

Entrepreneurship refers to an individual’s ability to

turn ideas into action. It includes creativity,

innovation and risk taking, as well as the ability to

plan and manage projects in order to achieve

objectives. This supports everyone in day-to-day life

at home and society, makes employees more aware of

the context of their work and better able to seize

opportunities, and provides a foundation for

entrepreneurs establishing a social or commercial

activity (Commission of the European Communities,

2006).

The Consortium for Entrepreneurship Education

(2008) states that entrepreneurship education is not

just about teaching someone to run a business. It is

also encouraging creative thinking and promoting a

strong sense of self-worth and empowerment.

Through entrepreneurship education, students learn

how to create business, but they also learn a lot more.

The core knowledge created via entrepreneurship

education includes:

 The ability to recognize opportunism in one’s

life

 The ability to pursue opportunities, by

generating new ideas and found the needed

resources

 The ability to create and operate a new firm

 The ability to think in a creative and critical

manner

2.2 Nurturing Entrepreneurship Culture

via Formal Education

Previous studies have shown that entrepreneurship is

a discipline similar to any other discipline and

therefore it can be learned. A person is neither born

nor fated to be entrepreneur. Researchers have

expressed the belief that entrepreneurs can be created

by way of effective education, training, and the

nurturing process. Drucker (1994) posited that: Most

of what you hear about entrepreneurship is all wrong.

It’s not magic, it’s not mysterious, and it has nothing

to do with genes. It’s a discipline and like any other

discipline it can be learned.

Based on the above argument, the

entrepreneurship programs offered by local public

school or universities either in the form of

compulsory core subject or embedded in the

curriculum is aimed to produce as many graduate

entrepreneurs as possible. Nevertheless, the impact

has not been satisfactory if the program has failed to

attract graduates to venture into entrepreneurship

activities immediately after graduation.

2.3 The Essentials of Entrepreneurship

Education

Entrepreneurship education has been promoted based

on the belief that entrepreneurship can be nurtured

and learnt. In addition, continuous exposure to

entrepreneurship activities can enchance student’s

inclination to venture into these activities. In addition

to a student’s acquiring the entrepreneurship

knowledge and experience, their family backgrounds,

personal experiences, and external environment were

also found to influence their intentions towards

involvement in entrepreneurship activities.

People with a family background in business tend

to have higher inclinations towards entrepreneurial

activities compared to those who do not. Early and

continuous exposure to entrepreneurship activities

have inculcated the tacit knowledge that was found to

positively influence a person’s intention and

behaviour to venture into business in particular.

On the other hand, students who have been

exposed to entrepreneurship education were found to

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positively correlate to an inclination towards

venturing in business.

They possessed entrepreneurial characteristics

and act entrepreneurially compared to other student

without similar exposure (Cheng et al., 2009). Thus,

entrepreneurship education becomes vital to

nurturing and encouraging students to choose

entrepreneurship as a career option. Therefore, the

number of graduate entrepreneurs will likely increase

if more students are exposed to entrepreneurship

education programs and activities in high school.

Curriculum, however should be designed to

maximize students learning experience via the

entrepreneurship education and enterprise education

models. Conversely, student who have previous

working experience could perform entrepreneurially

as they already possess many entrepreneurial

characteristics. Under the current employment

scenario, prospective employers prefers students who

can act entrepreneurially as they are able to deal with

the dynamics of the business environment.

2.4 Entrepreneurship Education

Effectiveness

Generally, entrepreneurship education should be able

to offer students with an understanding of a business

purpose, stucture and how the business interconnects

withe society and the economy. Entrepreneurship

education should be able to impart skills that can be

imparted through the educational system that enable

individuals to develop new, innovative plans. Past

studies have suggested that entrepreneurship

education should start early within the education

system. The entrepreneurial knowledge and skills

gained through their entrepreneurship education are

used over their lifetime as it encourages creative

thinking and promotes a strong sense of self-worth

and empowerment. Entrepreneurship education

offered at university level is known to have a positive

influence in creating a career prospect.

Entrepreneurship education is deemed important and

there was an urgue for entrepereneurship education to

be a subject at all level of institutions of learning.

3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Most of the existing entrepreneurship education

curriculum emphasises the theoretical knowledge and

gives less attention to the practical application of the

subject. The programs accentuate the established

knowledge, however they are frail on skill

development and tacit experiences, which are critical

features for nascent entrepreneurs. Presently, in the

conventional way of teaching entrepreneurship,

students are exposed to the philosophy and theory

with minimum exposure to the practical aspects. The

applications to imagination, creativity and innovation

have only been theoretically explained, and as result,

students have been unable to emulate and grasp the

experience of being an entrepreneur. This particular

shortcoming needs to be revamped as its failure

entails serious implications on government

expenditures because it involves a huge amount of

money and wastes a lot of time.

In addition, an urgent review of the conventional

approach is needed as it does not emphasises the

teacher’s abilities within the entrepreneurship

subject. Such a review is more critical for cases when

the teacher has insufficient experience and

knowledge about entrepreneurship. To overcome

such a problem, the entrepreneurship edocators

competency should be intensified via contunious

learning and copetency-building through business

sabbaticals in order for them to gain more experience

that would enchance their teaching effectiveness.

Experiential learning is a pedagogical approach that

enhances the process of knowledge acquisition via an

experience-transformation process. This approach

postulates that effective learning can only take place

when experience is acquired.

Due the weaknesses that have prevailed in the

current teaching techniques, many researchers have

introduced a number of teaching approaches in

entrepreneurship education. New learning models

have been promoted to enchance the effectiveness of

the process of nurturing and motivating students

towards entrepreneurial activities. A South African

University has come out with the “Entrepreneurial

Performance Education Model” (EPEM) and the

“Entrepreneurial Education Model” (EEM). EPEM

emphasizes motivation, entrepreneurial skills, and

business skills that influence entrepreneurial

performance. EEM takes into account the fact that

facilitator and the teaching approach are essential

elements in the education program. Such a myth may

drive students to assume that nobody can turn him or

herself into a successful entrepreneur even when

acquiring entrepreneurship education, or that no one

can become an entrepreneur unless he or she were to

be one.

Beside knowledge and skills in business,

entrepreneurship education is mainly about the

development of certain beliefs, values and attitude,

with the aim to get students to really consider

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323

entrepreneurship as an attractive and valid alternative

to paid employment or unemployment.

Given the proliferation of entrepreneurship

education, it is necessary to organize this topic

framework, suggested a three-category framework.

The author distinguishes between education about

enterprise, education for enterprise and education in

enterprise, recognising the roles that the different

types of education represent. The first category deals

mainly with awareness creation, and has the aim of

educating students on the issues about setting up and

running business. Enterprise modules within business

and other courses at undergraduate or postgraduate

level can also be included in this category.

Education for enterprise, the second category,

deals more with the training of aspiring entrepreneurs

for a career in self-employment with the aim of

encouraging participants to set up and run their own

business. Individuals are taught the practical skills

required for business management. The courses are

often directed towards the preparation of a business

plan. Business start-up and would be examples of this

type of entrepreneurship training.

The third category, education in enterprise,

includes management training of established

entrepreneurs and focuses on ensuring the expansion

and development and marketing courses. Such

training provides skills, knowledge’s and attitudes for

entrepreneurs to go out and innovate and solve their

own, and the firm, problems.

The most relevant objectives of enterprise

education are ti develop enterprising people and

encourage an attitude of autonomy using suitable

learning processes. The entrepreneurship education

and training programmes are aimed directly at

stimulating entrepreneurship (mostly directed to

entrepreneurs whose aim is the development of

opportunity-seeking within firms).

It is imperative to have in mind that

entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship education,

from an early age in one’s life, dose not only concern

business, start-ups and new venture.

Entrepreneurship has mostly to do with ability that an

individual has to turn his or her inspirations into

actions.

With more education and encouragement, youth

should be able to realize their entrepreneurial

aspirations. This outcome will increase economic

growth in communities and open new job and career

opportunities, regardless of economic circumstances.

Although not all youth will become entrepreneurs, all

students and society benefit when individuals have

solid education, that gives them entrepreneurial

knowledge and skills to use over their lifetime.

4 CONCLUSIONS

The educational systems influences the knowledge

base, the achievement of skills, competences and

attitudes on which future career choices are based.

Since these decisions are essential to the future of the

individual, school has the responsibility to inform and

expose students to a wide range of career options,

including entrepreneurship.

Youth needs motivation either through funding or

other support mechanism from all stakeholders such

as governments, teachers, family, friends and

religious group in order to bring the dream business

to become reality.

The literature review done had provided some

indications about a positive link between

entrepreneurial education and developing spirit

entrepreneurship in the high school student. The

education and training should centre itself much more

in changing personal attitudes than in knowledge,

because the effects could be more significant to the

process of business creation and to overcome the

perceived barriers to entrepreneurship. The

educational systems need to be oriented to emphasize

and value entrepreneurship in order to promote an

enterprise culture.

The growing interest in entrepreneurship

education and the research regarding the impact of

such education present some important policy

question both for institutions that deliver

entrepreneurship education programmes and for

support organizations that provide funding.

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