Embedding Enterprise in the Curriculum - the Staff

PerspectiveKirsty Grant and Katie Hook, Student

ResearchersSheila Quairney, Enterprise Centre

What is Enterprise in the Curriculum?• An approach to learning, not a subject in itself• The application of creative ideas and innovation to practical situations • A generic concept that can be applied across all areas of education• Combines creativity, ideas development and problem solving with

expression, communication and practical action • Does not necessarily refer to creating a project or business venture • Produces graduates with the mindset and skills to come up with original

ideas in response to identified needs and shortfalls, and the ability to act on them

• Includes taking the initiative, intuitive decision making, making things happen, networking, identifying opportunities, creative problem solving, strategic thinking, and personal effectiveness

• Enterprise education extends beyond knowledge acquisition to a wide range of emotional, intellectual, social, and practical skills

Why do Enterprising Skills Matter?

• 'The labour market requires graduates with enhanced skills who can think on their feet and be innovative in a global economic environment' (The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), April 2012)

• 'Universities should reflect on the strategies they use to ensure that students have the opportunity to develop enterprise skills both through the formal curriculum and through optional study or practice, and reflect on the integration of enterprise education in the professional development programmes for academic staff'

(Review of Business–University Collaboration :Professor Sir Tim Wilson DL)

• 'We must not lose sight of the talent universities are really put on earth to deliver. They must provide us with people with the ability to continually learn, to think critically and theoretically, to be reflective and reflexive, to innovate and break the status quo, and to navigate in the unstable waters of the global economy.' Dr David Docherty, chief executive of the Council for Industry and Higher Education

Research Aims

1) To ascertain what involvement staff, at Sheffield Hallam University, perceive they should have in sharing notions of enterprise with their students

2) To explore the perspectives of academic staff on how enterprise might be developed in the curriculum to support employability

Methodology

• Convenience sample of lecturers, across faculties

• Participation was voluntary and responses anonymised

• Exploratory qualitative approach

• 30 semi-structured interviews conducted lasting between 20-30 minutes

• Thematic analysis of data

Our Experience

Results

• Participants N = 30

• All active permanent teaching staff (years teaching M = 9.8, SD=8.8)

• 40% (n=12) in faculty of SBS, similar responses between D&S, ACES and H&WB

• 46.7% (n=14) of staff previous role had been in the private sector with the rest split between academic and public sector roles

Preliminary Findings

1) Defining enterprise education

2) Embedding enterprise

3) Influence of staff background

4) Importance of students' real-life experience

5) One size doesn’t fit all

6) Initiative Overload

Defining Enterprise Education?

“It’s employability we talk about and that’s what the university talks about . . . They don’t talk about enterprise.”

"I think it would be good to know what the university meant by enterprise in reality rather than the definition…still giving academics the freedom to make it more relevant to their subject"

Embedding Enterprise

"I think the barrier could be just that something else has to go so that the curriculum has been devised where it is quite constrained to the objectives of that particular course and there isn't a way where it can actually fit in"

“It should be embedded in the curriculum but its got to be the best fit depending on what the degree discipline is and everything has to be created to that"

Influence of Staff Background

"What credibility do you have when you pretend to prepare people to become professionals out there in the marketplace when you yourself have no real link with the environment? "

"We might understand the theory but do we actually understand the conditions for enterprise?"

Importance of Students' Real-Life Experience

"The problem is trying to teach them (students) skills that they don’t understand they need, because they have had no exposure to…the real world"

“Standing up and doing a talk about what it means to be enterprising is probably going to send someone to sleep. Unless they get a chance to experience that, to practice that in some way . . .”

One Size Doesn’t Fit All

For the students, "one size doesn’t fit all its about giving people the chance to think about this as an option for them" - commenting on embedding enterprise into the curriculum

“You can’t give them the drive and the tenacity and the determination . . . You hope to create the conditions in which they find that in themselves”

Initiative Overload

"There's a three line whip to attend an employability conference"

"The dictate came down…this was quite a threatening way of dealing with introducing something…it was the thunderbolt like 'thou shalt do this' rather than saying look what you have got? That’s excellent, how can we grow this"

“There seems to be so many initiatives that one isn’t maybe fully clear in terms of what’s on offer.”

Challenges during the Project

• Recruitment of participants

• Time Scale

• Finding mutually convenient dates to meet

• Capitalising on the vast range of ideas emerging

Learning and Recommendations• Staff could see the value of teaching

enterprising skills to increase students’ employability but clarification over terminology is needed

• Staff would benefit from support from the university to develop a clearer picture of how they can adapt their subject expertise to be delivered in a more enterprising way

• Staff felt frustrated at the volume and delivery of new initiatives. Examples of good practice should be celebrated and shared amongst staff and across faculties to facilitate shared learning.

Learning and Recommendations

So what now?

• Continue the thematic analysis

• Disseminate a short report

• Publication for a peer reviewed journal

• Findings to be included as part of the background to forthcoming enterprise centre review

We happily invite any questions

Thank You for Listening