Eurostat estimates that 17.931 million men and women in the EU-28[1], of whom 14.111 million were in the euro area (EA-19)[2], were unemployed in January 2018. Compared with December 2017, the number of persons unemployed decreased by 19 000 in the EU-28 and by 10 000in the euro area.
Even people following an adult education pathway are more enthusiastic in the last years about starting their own business; the situation in Europe is not the same for people of any age. Within the current crisis across all over Europe, one factor that worries the most is the rate of unemployment. Numbers are devastating, and a big amount of those that finished the compulsory education, although they want to work and are qualified to work, cannot find any working opportunity. Historically, women have been more affected by unemployment than men.
From the EU countries involved in the project, the highest unemployment rates were observed in Greece (20.9 % in November 2017). In Portugal, the unemployment rate Portugal fell from 10.1 % in 2016 to 7.9 % in 2017). For the other countries involved in the project the unemployment rates in January 2018: 4.2% in the Netherlands, 6.5% in Sweden and 11.1% in Italy.
However, not depending on the country, these people are either unemployed or economically inactive and are either looking for work or are inactive for reasons other than having a career at home.
“The need to promote entrepreneurship with creativity and innovation in all forms of learning, regardless of education level” is an education priority of the European Commission.
“Support systems have a vital role to play in making progress. Schools and adult education providers should establish links and cooperation structures with businesses and community organizations to support their entrepreneurship curriculum” (Entrepreneurship Education: A Guide for Educators, EU, 2013).
Given the facts above, in order to reduce unemployment, the entrepreneurial education is considered a key factor for competitiveness and employment, social inclusion and personal development. The rapid changes in the information society continuously require new skills and new information. In order to adapt to this need we need a new type of attitude, initiative and responsibility. The valorization of entrepreneurial attitude will improve traditional education, preparing people for life and offering the opportunities to adult people to find their place in the labour market, either by more easily finding a new job as a result of having an entrepreneurial attitude and mindset, or by starting and running their own business.
The role of education as a foundation for the future and as the main factor responsible for the development of professional skills is to encourage adult learners to practice by developing innovative ideas centered on creativity, through a process of “learning by doing”. Learning though ecosystems of entrepreneurship will be even more urgent in the near and more distant future, because low-skilled jobs are systematically disappearing from the European labor market.
Unfortunately, at the moment the education systems across Europe are not delivering this, as they are either based on traditional general empowerment or on the training of specific skills. Therefore they are not responding to the need for entrepreneurial learning, innovative learning settings and interaction with real-life situations.
Our project aims to incubate and promote the entrepreneurial spirit through the development of a model ecosystem, which will stimulate creativity and entrepreneurship.
The main aim of the project is, therefore, to empower trainers to create ecosystems of entrepreneurial learning for adult education, by assuming the role of the drivers of such ecosystems. The specific objectives of the project are:
-Promoting entrepreneurial culture by creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem, oriented to change, innovation and creativity
-Developing entrepreneurship at different levels of training as an incentive for people through strengthening entrepreneurial initiatives as a source of progress
-Developing entrepreneurial skills among people by raising awareness towards entrepreneurial culture
The primary target group will consist of trainers selected from/by the partner organizations and local partners (stakeholders). They will be the mentors, by using the peer training method, to the secondary target group which will consist of larger group of trainers from the partner communities – decision makers in the field of education- who will be involved in developing the local ecosystems of entrepreneurial learning.