The Teaching and Practice of Entrepreneurship within Canadian Higher Education Institutions

2. The Survey

2.1 Dimensions/Sub-Dimensions

The survey was developed by the European Commission in relation to a framework model that identifies six core dimensions of entrepreneurship education, which are further divided into sub-dimensions:^{Footnote 1}

i) Strategy: Policies and goals that illustrate the degree of an institution's commitment to entrepreneurship education.

Sub-Dimensions

Entrepreneurship goals: Entrepreneurship objectives embedded in the institution's mission statement or overarching goals to promote entrepreneurship.
Entrepreneurship policies: Established written institution-wide policies / action plans to support entrepreneurship.
Strategic embeddedness: Appointed persons (principal/provost, pro-vice-chancellor/dean/ professor/lecturer) with management influence to oversee the implementation of policies and goals.

ii) Institutional Infrastructure: Sources of support outside the classroom for those interested in entrepreneurship.

Sub-Dimensions

Approaches: Access to entrepreneurship departments, entrepreneurship centres, incubator facilities and/or technology transfer offices.
Entrepreneurship appointments: Appointed entrepreneurship chairs (tenured and non-tenured), not including associate and assistant professors, to support entrepreneurship across campus.
Research in entrepreneurship: Research on entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship education.
Cross-discipline structures: Structures to permit students to receive credit towards their degree for taking entrepreneurship courses. The sub-dimension also considers cross-faculty entrepreneurship activities to offer opportunities for students from different faculties to work together.

iii) Resources: Funding and resources dedicated to entrepreneurship education.

Sub-Dimensions

Budget allocation: Financial support for entrepreneurship education and an overall budget for entrepreneurship.
Income generation: Money raised for entrepreneurship education.
Type of funding: Established financial commitments towards entrepreneurship education (short-, medium- or long-term financing).

iv) Teaching and Learning: Theoretical learning component of entrepreneurship education.

Sub-Dimensions

Courses: Number of courses in entrepreneurship education, by level of study (undergraduate, graduate, postgraduate).
Degrees: Access to degree programs in entrepreneurship, by level of study.
Curriculum: Methods used in the development of an entrepreneurship curriculum, such as learning from other institutions (within Canada and internationally), liaising with practitioners or cross-faculty/ interdisciplinary collaboration.
Teaching methods:^{Footnote 2} Use of lectures, case studies, practitioners, project teams, company visits and/ or simulations.
Extracurricular activities: Use of seminars, business plan competitions, company visits, matchmaking events between students and external stakeholders, mentoring schemes.

v) Development: Processes in place to evaluate and monitor the effectiveness of entrepreneurship education.

Sub-Dimensions

Evaluation: Formalized evaluation procedures to follow up on attaining entrepreneurship goals and strategies.
User-driven improvement: Evaluation of entrepreneurship courses to measure the outcome of courses from the perspective of students and end-users (employees, investors, etc.).
Human resource development and management: Recognition of staff achievements in entrepreneurship education, requirement of staff to have entrepreneurial experience, inviting guest lecturers.

vi) Outreach: Links with community and connecting students with those experienced in entrepreneurship.

Sub-Dimensions

Alumni: Kept in touch with alumni, involved alumni in entrepreneurship activities.
Links with stakeholders: Established links with foundations, private companies, entrepreneurs, government, science parks / incubators or specialized bodies in entrepreneurship.
Community engagement: Students provided with internships, work projects and business competitions to develop entrepreneurial mindsets and skills.

The six dimensions used in this survey represent the fundamental elements behind a framework for entrepreneurship education.

2.2 Methodology

Before administering the survey in Canada, representatives from one university, one college, the Canadian Federation of Business School Deans (CFBSD) and the Association of Canadian Community Colleges (ACCC) reviewed and commented on the Survey of Entrepreneurship Education in Higher Education in Europe to ensure it was conducive to the Canadian higher education system.

The online Canadian survey included a preliminary assessment (nine questions) and a main survey of 68 questions. The purpose of the preliminary assessment was to establish an overall profile of an institution to determine if it provided an adequate level of entrepreneurship education to warrant continuing with the main survey.

To qualify for the survey, the institution had to satisfy at least one of three criteria:

The institution offers curricular or extracurricular activities focusing on the development of entrepreneurial behaviour, skills, knowledge, mindsets and experiences.
The institution offers courses in which entrepreneurship accounts for more than 25 percent of the course curriculum.
The institution has offered entrepreneurship education for more than one year.

2.3 Target Participants

Business school deans and directors of entrepreneurship centres were the target participants for the survey. With the assistance of the CFBSD and ACCC, a contact list was generated.

2.4 Response Rates

In total, 204 institutions were invited to participate in the survey — 69 universities and 135 colleges. A total of 36 universities responded and qualified to complete the main survey, for a university response rate of 52.2 percent (Table 1). A total of 32 colleges participated in the survey, for a college response rate of 23.4 percent. Included in this sample are seven colleges that responded to the survey invitation but did not qualify to complete the main survey. Given that the college sample population was twice as large as the university pool, it is hard to determine if the low response rate amongst colleges was due to an absence of entrepreneurship education at the college level or simply due to a low survey response rate.

Table 1: Response Rates (%) by Institution and Canadian Region
Canadian Region	University Response Rate (%)	College Response Rate (%)	Total Response Rate (%)
West (British Columbia, Alberta, Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut)	78.6	18.9	35.3
Prairies (Manitoba and Saskatchewan)	33.3	18.8	22.7
Ontario	56.5	51.6	53.7
Quebec	55.6	9.3	17.3
Atlantic (New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island)	29.4	20.0	25.9
Total Response Rate	52.2	23.4	33.0

The overall response rate for the survey was 33 percent, representing more than 60 percent of the total undergraduate population in Canada between 2007 and 2008.^{Footnote 3} Appendix C provides a complete list of participating institutions.

2.5 Spider Diagrams

Institutions were given an indexed average score for each dimension and sub-dimension. Spider diagrams (using a score from 0 to 100) were used to compare the scores of each institution against three Canadian subsets:

average score of the five institutions that scored highest in the survey;
average score of the five institutions that scored lowest in the survey; and
average overall score of the Canadian sample.

The same three subsets were created using the European Union (EU) data to compare each Canadian institution with those in the EU. In total, 14 spider diagrams were developed for each institution, which are housed in an online benchmarking tool. A future Industry Canada report will analyze the comparison of the Canadian and EU subsets.

2.6 Online Benchmarking Tool

Each participating institution was given a unique username and pass code to access its respective spider diagrams on the online benchmarking tool. To maintain confidentiality, institutions were only allowed access to their spider diagrams and not those of other institutions. Non-participating institutions can access the site to view the spider diagrams of the three Canadian and EU subsets to compare Canada's overall performance in the entrepreneurship education framework.