This thesis presents an exploration of ‘how entrepreneurship education pedagogy can enhance undergraduate business students’ autonomous motivation for self-directed learning’. It has twin, equally valuable, purposes: to make an original theoretical contribution and to improve professional practice in this area. The work addresses the lack of pedagogical research in entrepreneurship education that focuses on learner development, with a specific aim at development of self-directed learning skills for lifelong learning. The research is approached with a concurrent, mixed methods design, comparing pre- and a post-EE, self-assessment survey results from 245 students, enrolled in a Young Enterprise venture creation programme, and a control group at a Dutch university. With the use of open-question surveys among the same population, during and after the EE modules, as well as from focus group discussions with a selection of participating students and teachers, explanation was sought for the observations drawn from the quantitative study. Significant relationships were found between students’ self-reported maturity of autonomy, self-efficacy, and motivation for learning, and in how these relate to self-directed learning readiness. Entrepreneurship education was found to significantly moderate the relationship between the learning characteristics and self-directed learning, and to strengthen of the students’ perceived readiness for self-directed learning. Explanation for the impact of EE were found to be related to the stage-wise, mixed pedagogy approach to learning, that combines authentic learning with a hierarchical approach to competence development, and supportive team dynamics. The research contributes to practice with a proposed conceptual framework for understanding how to prepare for self-directed learning readiness and a teaching-learning framework for its development in formal educational settings. It contributes to knowledge with its deeper understanding of how students experience learning in EE and how that affects their willingness to pursue learning opportunities.
Described are the results of an investigation in the appreciation of distance learning, limited to a case study with an online lab-experiment. Together with other educational institutes and companies Fontys University of Applied Sciences participated in a number of projects in which distance learning courses were developed. Some courses have been integrated in the regular curriculum. Our study was set up to get insight into the appreciation of students for this way of learning, especially concerning online lab-experiments. By using surveys and interviews after the students accomplished either a regular course or a distance learning course on the same object we tried to get a better understanding of how students used the course and appreciated it. Also we wanted to know whether an online lab-experiment is more or less effective than a regular one. Preliminary data analyses have shown that the appreciation of an online lab-experiment is dependent on a number of items, like the educational contents of the experiment itself, the way accompanying theory is presented, possibilities of doing the experiment in an alternative way, the organization around the experiment etc. It appears also that students give serious suggestions on developing other online lab-experiments.
Educational programs teaching entrepreneurial behaviour and knowledge are crucial to a vital and healthy economy. The concept of building a Communities of Practice (CoP) could be very promising. CoP’s are formed by people who engage in a process of collective learning in a shared domain of human endeavour (Wenger, McDermott and Snyder, 2002). They consist of a group of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly. Normally CoP’s are rather homogeneous. Saxion institute Small Business & Retail Management (SB&RM) started a CoP with entrepreneurs September 2007. Typical in the this community, are the differences between the partners. The Community consists of students, entrepreneurs and members of an institution for higher education. They have different characteristics and they don’t share the same knowledge. Thus, building long-lasting relations can be complicated. Solid relations for longer periods are nevertheless inevitable in using CoP as a mean in an educational concept that takes approximately 4 years. After one year an evaluation took place on the main aspects of a lasting partnership. The central problem SB&RM in Deventer faces is to design the CoP in a way possible members will join and stay for a longer period and in a way it ensures entrepreneurial learning. This means important design characteristics have to be identified, and the CoP in Deventer has to be evaluated to assess whether it meets those design characteristics in an effective and efficient way. The main target of the evaluation is to determine which key factors are important to make sure continuity in partnership is assured and entrepreneurial learning is best supported. To solve the problem, an investigation on how a CoP works, what group dynamics take place, and how this can be measured has to be conducted. Furthermoreusing the CoP as a tool for entrepreneurship means key aspects of entrepreneurial learning have to be identified. After that the CoP in Deventer has to be examined on both aspects. According to literature CoP’s define themselves along three dimensions: domain (indicating what is it about), community (defining how it functions), and practice (indicating what capabilities it has produced) (Wenger, 1998). This leads to meaningful, shared and coordinated activities (Akkerman et al, 2007): Key aspects of a successful CoP lie in both hard and soft sides of creating a partnership. It means on one hand a CoP has to deal with defining their own overall vision, formulating long term goals and targets on the short term. They have to formulate how to achieve those targets and create meaningful activities (reification). On the other hand a CoP has to deal with relations, trust, norms and values (participation). Reification and participation as design characteristic can provide indicators on which the CoP in Deventer can be evaluated. A lasting partnership means joining the CoP and staying. Weick provides us with a suitable model that enables us to do research and evaluate whether the CoP in Deventer is successful or not, Weick’s model of means convergence. To effectively ensure entrepreneurial learning the process in the CoP has to provide or enable actionoriented forms through Project-based activity, accompanied by reflection, with high emotional exposure (or cognitive affection) preferably caused by discontinuities to be suitable as a tool in entrepreneurial learning. Furthermore it should be accompanied by the right preconditions to work effectively and efficiently. The evaluation of the present CoP in Deventer is done by interviewing all participants at the end of the first year of the partnership. In a structured interview, based on literature studies, all participants were separately questioned
The Dutch hospitality industry, reflecting the wider Dutch society, is increasingly facing social sustainability challenges for a greying population, such as increasing burnout, lifelong learning, and inclusion for those distanced from the job market. Yet, while the past decades have seen notable progress regarding environmental sustainability and good governance, more attention should be paid to social sustainability. This concern is reflected by the top-sector healthcare struggles caused by mounting social welfare pressure, leading to calls by the Dutch government for organizational improvement in social earning capacity. Furthermore, the upcoming EU legislation on CSRD requires greater transparency regarding financial and non-financial reporting this year. Yet, while the existing sustainability accreditation frameworks offer guidance on environmental sustainability and good governance reporting, there must be more guidance on auditing social sustainability. The hospitality industry, as a prominent employer in the Netherlands, thus has a societal and legislative urgency to transition its social earning capacity. Dormben Hotel The Hague OpCo BV (Dormben) has thus sought support in transitioning its social sustainability standards to meet this call. Hotelschool, the Hague leads the consortium, including Green Key Nederland and Dormben, by employing participatory design to present a social sustainability accreditation framework. Initially, Dr. David Brannon and Dr. Melinda Ratkai from Hotelschool The Hague will draft a social sustainability accreditation framework informed by EFRAG. Subsequently, Erik van Wijk, from Green Key Nederland, the hospitality benchmark for sustainability accreditation, and Sander de Jong, from Dormben, will pilot the framework through four participatory workshops involving hospitality operators. Later, during a cross-industry conference, Dr. David Brannon and Dr. Melinda Ratkai will disseminate a social sustainability toolkit across their academic and industry networks. Finally, conference and workshop participants will be invited to form a social sustainability learning community, discussing their social earning capacity based on the revised sustainability accreditation.
Het project "Port State Control" was aangevraagd om onderzoek te kunnen doen naar de oorzaak wan het grote aantal aanhoudingen van Nederlandse schepen in buitenlandse havens. Doel van het onderzoek was om belangrijke oorzaken daarvan boven water te krijgen en oplossingen daarvoor te onderzoeken en bedenken. Schepen worden door PSC gecontroleerd, waarbij er wordt gekeken of ze voldoen aan de internationale wet- en regelgeving, met name de veiligheid aan boord. Reders en bemanning zijn verantwoordelijk voor een veilige uitvoer van de taken aan boord. Indien er tekortkomingen worden geconstateerd, mag een PSC-autoriteit een schip aanhouden. Uit de onderzoeken naar de oorzaken blijk onder andere: - Nalatigheid bemanning bij controles installaties door werkdruk en repetitief werk, kennis niet beschikbaar. - Nalatigheid rederij; besparen op onderhoudskosten. - Het aantal en de kwaliteit van de bemanning aan boord van Nederlandse schepen. - Nalatigheid eindconsument; logistiek proces dient zo goedkoop mogelijk te zijn vanwege lage prijs. Consequentie: minder investeringen in bemanningen en scheepsonderhoud. Het project doet daarom de volgende aanbevelingen: Om bemanningen aan boord zo goed mogelijk voor te bereiden op PSC-inspecties is kennisvalorisatie erg belangrijk. De laatste informatie dient beschikbaar te zijn. Rederij is daar werantwoordelijk voor. De betrokkenheid van de reder is belangrijk bij het motiveren van de bemanning. Daarbij is scheepsfamiliarisatie cruciaal. Net zoals het verantwoordelijkheidsgevoel m.b.t. de scheepsveiligheid. Een tastbaar eindproduct van het project is de Port State Contol app. De app is een digitale omgeving die laat zien hoe situaties wel of niet horen te zijn. Met deze app worden bemanningsleden bekend gemaakt met het schip waar ze op komen te varen. Innovaties als Virtual Reality en distance learning zou de essentiële verbeterslag gemaakt kunnen !Worden. Met inzet van digitale hulpmiddelen kan de familiarisatie van nieuwe bemanningsleden werbeterd worden zodat zij beter zijn voorbereid op de taak aan boord.
Sustainable business decision-making as villagers of the world In making our society resilient and future-proof we are faced with many complex and multi-faceted challenges and opportunities. Many promising sustainable initiatives require the proactive contribution of businesses to be successful, but fail to reach the required decision making level of individuals and companies, and thus fail to reach their positive impact. The result is a multiple waste: in creativity and innovation, in investment of the organisations involved, in opportunities to improve society and in our overall belief that we can make the necessary changes. In this project we focus on the reasons why individuals and thus companies act and decide negatively on new and existing sustainable innovations and projects, starting from the perspective that a professional’s and a company’s inherent sustainable decision making is at the heart of truly improving society. The aim is to create multiple value (economic, social and ecological) of SMEs by increasing the success rate of sustainability initiatives out of an implicit business professional’s choice to do so. Based on the theory of psychological distance, we combine exploratory case studies of successful pilots with exploratory research via interviews with business decision makers, to analyse what drives professional’s and companies’ decision making, and how this affects sustainable initiatives. The aim is to propose ways to increase the quality of sustainable decision making, and thus the likelihood of success. The learnings are translated to practical guidelines a SME should consider for executing their business in the most sustainable way, and form a base for further applied research on sustainable business behaviour towards a circular economy.
