Edgar Izquierdo

1
Design and Implementation of an Innovative
Entrepreneurship Course Looking for Perfection
or the Right Drive?

• Edgar Izquierdo
• Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, Ecuador
  
• Guido Caicedo
• Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, Ecuador
• Dirk Deschoolmeester
• Ghent University, Belgium
• Virginia Lasio
• Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, Ecuador
• 2006 AEEE Conference, Ghent - Belgium
• August 23-26

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Main Research Questions

• What is the cumulative experience gained by the
  educators and its coaching team on the design and
  implementation of an activity-based introductory
  entrepreneurship course?
• What are the perceptions of students and
  instructors on the educational experience after
  one year delivering the entrepreneurship course
  at ESPOL?

3
Relevance of the study

• 1) Attempt to shed some light on the ongoing
  debate over what and how should be taught in an
  introductory entrepreneurship course
• 2) Valuable information for educators
• 3) Lessons learned after one year of experience
  teaching the course to undergraduate engineering
  students.

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Issues on the Course Design Process

• The need of complementing the students technical
  background with entrepreneurial training.
• Expected to enhance the entrepreneurial activity
  among students and faculty
• The course was developed under the context of the
  Entrepreneurship Development component,
  VLIR-IUS Program.
• Several perspectives have played a role in the
  design of the entrepreneurship course
• Major source of inspiration originated from
  courses on entrepreneurship taught at the
  Department of Management Entrepreneurship,
  Faculty of Economics and Business Administration,
  Ghent University.
• Faculty members of ESPOL received training under
  the so called Training the Trainers program.

5
Educational Framework

• The course was conceived under two premises
• Students enrolled in the course are adults
• An activity-based course promotes significant
  learning experiences.

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Structure and Content

• Mandatory course for all undergraduate students
  at ESPOL
• ESPOL, essentially technical-oriented university.
• Six basic units
• entrepreneurship and its contribution to the
  worlds economy
• creativity and its link to the innovation
  process
• identification and evaluation of business
  opportunities
• review of entrepreneurial competencies
• issues related to new venture creation and
• development of a feasibility study (early stage
  business plan).

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Selection of Instructors

• Selected regardless of whether or not they own or
  have created an enterprise
• Although entrepreneurial experience is important
  for teaching an entrepreneurship course, other
  relevant aspects have also been considered
• strong desire to teach the course
• having formal training in business administration
  and/or entrepreneurship is required
• good communication skills and empathy with
  students
• ability to instill in students the development of
  an entrepreneurial spirit
• cooperative openness to get together and share
  teaching materials and relevant information.

8
Guidelines for the Course Delivery

• Well delineated guidelines are provided to timely
  and appropriately exercise a set of activities at
  each class session.
• Flexibility to deliver and accommodate the class
  sessions to instructors own styles and
  preferences.
• The course is delivered on a time schedule of 14
  weeks (56 hours of class sessions).
• The students performance is carried out
  according to the ESPOLs grading system.
• Each activity is evaluated emphasis on the term
  project.

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Organization of Class Sessions

• Students exercise theory-based activities on an
  individual or group basis.
• Open discussions among students about their
  findings.
• Feedback from the instructor on underlying
  theoretical concepts as related to the exercised
  activity.
• Plenary discussion to draw final conclusions on
  the learnt concepts.

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Teaching Approach

• Uses of a mix of techniques in a flexible way to
  promote meaningful learning.
• Follows the experiential learning model (ELM).
• Integrating previous knowledge, perception,
  cognition, and experience through a cycle
  (Kolbs model)
• concrete experience
• reflective observation
• abstract conceptualization
• active experimentation.

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Teaching Approach Seeks

• to confront the students beliefs, traits and
  capabilities with real-world situations,
  frequently faced by entrepreneurs when starting
  and running an enterprise.

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Method

• Focus group among instructors
• to get better insights of data gathered by means
  of the questionnaire.
• Two surveys administered to
• 12 Instructors
• 145 students

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Questionnaire for Instructors

• 8 items concerning teaching issues
• impact of the course content and the
  instructional approach on the instructors
  teaching
• follow-up of the course
• 3 items addressed aspects on students learning
• follow-up of students learning of specific
  skills.

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Questionnaire for Students

• Kirkpatricks Model used to measure reaction and
  learning
• Four-level model for evaluating training
  programs reaction, learning, behavior, results.
• Reaction level (7 items)
• Similar to measuring customer satisfaction
• Learning level (7 items)
• to measure whether the learning objectives have
  been accomplished

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Instructors Perceptions

• Positive impact of instructional approach
• On the instructors teaching in that it
  facilitates the development and implementation of
  meaningful learning.
• On keeping track of students progress and on
  providing effective feedback.
• Course approach supportive for reflective
  teaching
• it allows instructors to self-assess and analyze
  their teaching in order to find alternative
  strategies for an outstanding course delivery.

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Positive impact of the course approach on
students skills
S D Strongly disagree D Disagree N
Neutral A Agree S A Strongly agree
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Using the Focus Group

• The instructors claimed that their students have
  evidenced
• an improvement on oral and writing communication
  skills.
• better performance on abilities such as
  self-reflection, team work, critical thinking,
  and problem solving.
• Instructors found themselves more effective in
  coaching and planning their class sessions.

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Course Evaluation by Students

• Measuring students reaction

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• Measuring students learning

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Limitation of the Study

• Subjectivity of measurements as they are only
  based on perceptions.
• A more objective instrument based on special
  tests and observations is clearly needed.

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Discussion and Implications

• Promising indications on the effectiveness of an
  instructional approach based on activities.
• Clues as to how educators can reorient their
  efforts and existing practices for outstanding
  teaching.
• Suggested in and out-of-class activities seem to
  facilitate the development of relevant
  competencies and an attitude change towards
  entrepreneurship.
• The need of assessing the impact of each of the
  tools and a combination of them on the
  development of entrepreneurial competencies.

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Design and Implementation of an Innovative
Entrepreneurship Course Looking for Perfection
or the Right Drive?
Thank you
Dirk Deschoolmeester E-mail dirk.deschoolmeester
_at_ugent.be 2006 AEEE Conference, Ghent -
Belgium August 23-26