On the Impact of Entrepreneurship Education: Self-Efficacy and Shift in Perceptions

The vast majority of research on entrepreneurship education reveals its experiential nature. Under the lack of a consistent theory of entrepreneurship, an individual learns as (s)he 'does'. Educators actually facilitate the practice of trainees which leads them to obtain knowledge, to cultivate skills and it may also alter their attitudes towards business venturing. Reflection promoted during the courses is considered essential for the whole learning process. The theory of planned behaviour implies further the hypothesis that real entrepreneurial initiatives can result from underlying entrepreneurial intentions. In this frame, a measure of the impact of entrepreneurship education can be perceived as the number of consequent business start-ups from students who followed entrepreneurial courses. However, such a measure oversimplifies the objectives of fostering an entrepreneurial mindset which is the main goal of entrepreneurship education. The improvement of entrepreneurial self-efficacy, the quality of opportunities recognized, the adoption of innovation are, for instance, aspects inherently involved in the consequences of entrepreneurial learning. In the present paper, we present quantitative results for a non-business department in Greece as to discuss the impact of the entrepreneurship education provided. The present data is a subset of a global sample on the impact of entrepreneurship education in more than thirty countries; a project leaded by Illinois State University. The results are indicative for the Greek science student population examined. Further results on the alteration of conceptions about successful entrepreneurship due to the course are also shown, indicating a systematic "shift" of perceptions towards knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship. Difficulties to consistently develop statistical measures for the impact of entrepreneurship education concern its fundamental pedagogic approach, i.e. action learning, which is highly individualistic. Even though significant changes occur in the individual level, the corresponding "shift" in the group (or class) level may not be unique. Since entrepreneurship education is widely provided in modern higher education, the present work aims to contribute towards the understanding and quantitatively mapping the impact of entrepreneurial courses.