Entrepreneurship Education as a Strategy to Build Regional Sustainability

Grete Hagebakken, Christian Reimers and Elsa Solstad
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Grete Hagebakken: School of Business and Economics, UIT the Arctic University of Norway, Havnegata 5, 9480 Harstad, Norway
Christian Reimers: School of Business and Economics, UIT the Arctic University of Norway, Havnegata 5, 9480 Harstad, Norway
Elsa Solstad: School of Business and Economics, UIT the Arctic University of Norway, Havnegata 5, 9480 Harstad, Norway

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 5, 1-17

Abstract: Entrepreneurship education (EE) is a means to create economic activity and is of importance in the development of rural regions. Entrepreneurship education is generally conducted by three different methods: (1) teaching students about entrepreneurial themes, (2) developing the capabilities of becoming a successful entrepreneur for enterprise and (3) developing capabilities through enterprise by which persons learn through experience and discovery. Our research question is; How does education through entrepreneurship fit as a way to meet the needs of start-ups in a rural context? We follow an entrepreneurial case programme in our study by conducting observations of and interviews with 26 persons involved in the programme. Our findings are that participants consider the programme as an important contribution to the local/regional entrepreneurial ecosystem. However, it is also described as a short-lived ecosystem, from which the participants mostly benefit while on the programme and to a lesser degree afterwards. Sustainability plays a part in attracting participants but to a lesser degree forms the educational content and evaluation parameters. Our study contributes to the discussion of how education through entrepreneurship is organised as an accelerator programme to help start-ups in a rural context.

Keywords: entrepreneurial education; education through entrepreneurship; accelerator; case study; brain drain; regional development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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