FirstPreviousNextLast
View all pages

The Teaching and Practice of Entrepreneurship within Canadian Higher Education Institutions

4. Dimension 1: Strategy

Key Findings: Most institutions did not have an institution-wide strategy to deliver entrepreneurship education. Entrepreneurship education policies were predominantly found at the faculty level, which may limit the access students from other faculties have to entrepreneurship education.

Becoming an institute that fully supports entrepreneurship entails a complex process that requires parallel actions in a number of areas. It goes beyond providing entrepreneurship courses and/or engaging in efforts such as making use of placement programs in start-ups, establishing incubator facilities or appointing professors of entrepreneurship.

The strategy dimension of the survey seeks to identify a commitment within the institute to provide an entrepreneurial environment. A central element of facilitating sustainable and effective entrepreneurship education is to embed entrepreneurship in the overall strategy of the institution. Defining overarching and measurable entrepreneurship goals can stimulate this development and lay a framework to assess the impact of entrepreneurship education activities. The commitment to deliver entrepreneurship education is further reinforced if the goals are included in the overall mission statement of the institution.

4.1 Findings

Figure 1 illustrates how the three Canadian subsets (top five, bottom five and average score) compare within the three sub-dimensions of the strategy dimension:

  • 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.
Figure 1: Spider Diagram of Strategy Dimension (score out of 100)
Figure 1: Spider Diagram of Strategy Dimension (score out of 100)[Description of Figure 1]

Across all three sub-dimensions, the average score for Canada and the top five institutions was highest in the entrepreneurship goals sub-dimension, suggesting that institutions were more inclined to have established goals than policies or strategic embeddedness. For example, all of the top five institutions placed fostering entrepreneurial behaviour, skills and mindsets as an overarching entrepreneurship goal for the institution.

Although the difference in the average scores for Canada and the top five institutions was smallest in the strategic embeddedness sub-dimension, both scores were below 50, suggesting that more can be done to ensure that the person responsible for entrepreneurship education has sufficient management influence to implement policies. The average score for the bottom five institutions in Canada was below 10 in all three sub-dimensions.

Most institutions have general entrepreneurship goals; however, few have specific measurable goals (Table 2)

  • Only 28 percent of institutions instilled an overarching goal to provide access to entrepreneurship education for all students.
  • Moreover, while 51 percent aim to foster entrepreneurial behaviours, skills and mindsets amongst students, close to 40 percent of institutions did not have any institution-wide entrepreneurship goals.
Table 2: Percentage of Institutions with Various Overarching Entrepreneurship Education Goals
Overarching Entrepreneurship Education Goals Total Institutions
(%)		 University
(%)		 Degree-Granting College
(%)		 Technical Institutes
(%)

"—" indicates no institution or region responded.
Foster entrepreneurial behaviours, skills and mindsets 51 61 40 33
Inspire students to seek an entrepreneurial career or life 39 47 30 27
Seek opportunities to commercially exploit knowledge 33 47 10 13
Provide access to entrepreneurship opportunities for all students 28 33 30 13
Increase the number of graduate start-up businesses 20 28 10 7
Maximize technology transfer revenue 15 22 — 7
Entrepreneurship education should generate income 3 3 10 —
Institution doesn't have entrepreneurship goals 39 31 40 60

Strategic policies to deliver entrepreneurship education are sparse at the institution level and lie predominantly within specific faculties, such as business and engineering

  • At the institution level, only 23 percent of institutions had written institution-wide policies / action plans for undertaking entrepreneurship education.
  • At the faculty level, 46 percent of institutions had policies / action plans in place.
  • Across faculties there was limited exposure to entrepreneurship education:
    • 75 percent of institutions had entrepreneurship rooted in business studies;
    • 15 percent of institutions had entrepreneurship rooted in technical (engineering) disciplines; and
    • 5 percent of institutions had entrepreneurship rooted in social sciences.

A dean was more likely (44 percent) to be accountable for entrepreneurship education

  • Dean – 44 percent of institutions.
  • Professor – 21 percent of institutions.
  • No one – 18 percent of institutions.
  • Amongst entrepreneurship champions: Individuals who act as a spokesperson/advocate at the management level to support entrepreneurship activities:
    • Most were self-appointed; and
    • Most were primarily employed in the business, technical, health care and natural sciences areas, which may reinforce limited access and delivery of entrepreneurship education on campus.


FirstPreviousNextLast
View all pages