5 GREAT Reasons Why Entrepreneurship Should Be Taught In Secondary Schools

Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Thomas Friedman believes that if young people are inspired, they will create the companies that will provide long-lasting employment for each country’s citizens. Gone are the days – in the era of your father and grandmothers – when jobs, fantastic ones at that, were ready even before graduation from secondary school!

The reason he advocates that students, even before they graduate secondary school be equipped to be innovation ready, having been exposed to critical-thinking, communication and collaboration skills that will help them invent their own careers.

Are There Benefits?

• Entrepreneurship education benefits students from all backgrounds because it teaches them to think outside the box, bringing out talents and skills they never knew they had! Furthermore, it helps students develop confidence that will create jobs for the benefit of the country’s economy.
• Schools need not teach these skills on their own. They can reach out to organisations that help teachers teach entrepreneurship or take advantage of initiatives that pair kids of all ages with science and engineering experts so they can engage in hands-on projects. An example in Nigeria is the National ICT OLympiad.
• The benefits of entrepreneurship is numerous. Take an American youth for example, Julian Young who is now 29. He was a drug dealer facing a 15-year prison term when a mentor told him he was an entrepreneur. Years later, he became the founder and executive director of The Start Center for Entrepreneurship, an organisation that helps women and minorities launch businesses.
• Julian’s entrepreneurial instinct – though destructive at first – but when positively channeled helped him escape prison to become a successful business owner. In similar manner, at-risk students and even those already in jail can be helped to tap positively into their own unrealised talents. This will certainly reduce the number of talented persons in the prison, and save the government money for their care.
• Furthermore, entrepreneurship can help poor and vulnerable people create better lives for themselves and their families. Yet, not just students from poor backgrounds, even those from rich homes. This is so because if students were to study entrepreneurship, they would be forced to think outside the box; to fail and to persist – experiences that would inspire them to become creative, inventive and innovative whether poor or rich.

Additionally, entrepreneurship embraces talents and skills that teachers in conventional classrooms might penalise.

Entrepreneurs are anomalies; they don’t fit in, says Justin Young. They may not be book smart, but put them in a situation that requires them to use their people smarts and risk-taking skills, and they will thrive.

Such examples abound, like Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, who testifies that he was a bad student because he suffered from dyslexia.

Bo Peabody, another entrepreneur points out that:

Entrepreneurs tend to be B students — good at a variety of things, but not of A+ quality at one thing in particular. It’s this ability to think broadly that allows them to complete the variety of tasks necessary in starting companies.

More reasons for entrepreneurship education include the likelihood that it will promote social and emotional well-being, and also how it fires students to choose social entrepreneurship — doing well by doing good. Passnownow.com, and Khan Academy are prime examples of social entrepreneurship.

See Other Examples

1. Emily Raleigh, founder and CEO of The Smart Girls Group. It started as a digital magazine when Raleigh was a senior in secondary school, and now consists of 12 distinct brands ranging from newsletters to online classes to a network of professional adult women.
2. Maya Penn, a 13-year-old TED talker, sells her own knit scarves and hats online, and donates a percentage of her proceeds to nonprofit organisations.
3. Sixteen-year-old Erik Finman recalls a teacher telling him to drop out and work at McDonald’s, instead, he founded the video-chat tutoring program Botangle and the startup Intern for a Day, which connects companies with potential interns who work for a day on a project.

Are there similar examples in Nigeria? Most definitely! Even if you think you cannot find many of such examples around, wouldn’t you want to increase the number by being one yourself?

You could start by being the change you want to see in the world!

This article was adapted from entrepreneur,com

See Also: 15 Entrepreneurs Share Their Opinions on Work Ethic and Passion