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Entrepreneurial Potential in Secondary School Students. An Exploratory Evaluation

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Listed:
  • Antonio Bernal-Guerrero
  • Antonio Ramón Cárdenas-Gutiérrez
  • Ana María Domínguez-Quintero
  • à ngela Martín-Gutiérrez

Abstract

Over the last decade, various entrepreneurial school practices have proliferated, including the creation of mini-companies. In the Spanish context, the Empresa Joven Europea (EJE) program has been the most widely employed educative program in this respect. Empresa Joven Europea is an educational program that proposes that secondary education students create and manage their own mini-businesses, thereby taking the legal form of a cooperative society and facilitating the acquisition of all basic educational skills through the cultivation of entrepreneurship. Nevertheless, there is still a gap between the theory and the practice of entrepreneurship education which, together with the conceptual expansion experienced in recent years, increases the need to assess the effectiveness of this type of programs. By means of an explanatory and cross-sectional study, we evaluated the impact of the program on the configuration of the entrepreneurial potential of the participating adolescents ( N  = 270). The analysis has been carried out utilizing PLS-SEM with SmartPLS software version 3.3.9 and SPSS version 25. None of the six hypotheses formulated have been confirmed, which means that the desired effects have not been achieved in any of the three variables under study: attitudes, knowledge, and entrepreneurial skills. Such results may be related to aspects of curricular organization, the type of experiences based on cooperatives, a certain structural and conceptual lack of definition of the pedagogical methodology used, and the development of skills linked to identity. Moreover, it is possible that, although it is not evident in the competencies acquired, the program has influenced the apperception of what it means to be an entrepreneur and of the creation of critical awareness, which is associated with entrepreneurial potential. Our study, in addition to opening suggestions for further research along the same lines, presents several implications related to administrative and organizational aspects, to the design of the different pedagogical elements of the programs and to the evaluative criterion adopted.

Suggested Citation

  • Antonio Bernal-Guerrero & Antonio Ramón Cárdenas-Gutiérrez & Ana María Domínguez-Quintero & à ngela Martín-Gutiérrez, 2024. "Entrepreneurial Potential in Secondary School Students. An Exploratory Evaluation," SAGE Open, , vol. 14(2), pages 21582440241, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:sagope:v:14:y:2024:i:2:p:21582440241256780
    DOI: 10.1177/21582440241256780
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Antonio Bernal-Guerrero & Antonio Ramón Cárdenas-Gutiérrez & Elisabet Montoro-Fernández, 2020. "Basic business knowledge scale for secondary education students. Development and validation with Spanish teenagers," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(7), pages 1-22, July.
    2. Héctor Cuevas-Vargas & Neftalí Parga-Montoya & Rudy Fernández-Escobedo, 2019. "Effects of Entrepreneurial Orientation on Business Performance: The Mediating Role of Customer Satisfaction—A Formative–Reflective Model Analysis," SAGE Open, , vol. 9(2), pages 21582440198, June.
    3. Antonio Ramón Cárdenas-Gutiérrez & Antonio Bernal-Guerrero & Elisabet Montoro-Fernández, 2021. "Construction and validation of the Basic Scale of Entrepreneurial Competencies for the Secondary Education level. A study conducted in Spain," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(4), pages 1-21, April.
    4. Sarstedt, Marko & Hair, Joseph F. & Cheah, Jun-Hwa & Becker, Jan-Michael & Ringle, Christian M., 2019. "How to specify, estimate, and validate higher-order constructs in PLS-SEM," Australasian marketing journal, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 197-211.
    5. Gudergan, Siegfried P. & Ringle, Christian M. & Wende, Sven & Will, Alexander, 2008. "Confirmatory tetrad analysis in PLS path modeling," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 61(12), pages 1238-1249, December.
    6. Norris Krueger, 2020. "Entrepreneurial potential and potential entrepreneurs: 25 years on," Journal of the International Council for Small Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(1), pages 52-55, January.
    7. Susan Polirstok, 2017. "Strategies to Improve Academic Achievement in Secondary School Students: Perspectives on Grit and Mindset," SAGE Open, , vol. 7(4), pages 21582440177, November.
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    1. Xiaokang Zhao & Nyo Me Hlaing & Huali Shen & Pan Xiao & Tessema Shimelis Adugna, 2025. "The Role of Sustainable Business Environment in Shaping Entrepreneurs’ Performance: Evidence from Myanmar," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(2), pages 1-26, January.

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