Learning to navigate the landscape of participation. On the initiation of students into practices of entrepreneurship (and) education

ABSTRACT

Practicing entrepreneurship is important for entrepreneurial learning in institutionalized education. However, research is attentive to how this challenges conventional learning arrangements and requires teachers and students to change familiar ways of relating and participating. In this study, we investigate the landscape of participation in a case of experiential entrepreneurship education for non-business postgraduate students. Employing the notion of legitimate peripheral participation in communities of practice, we show how students are initiated into entrepreneurship education practice through three modes of participation: compliance, autonomy and authenticity. Even though these participatory modes make sense one by one, their accumulation created tension. Hereby, we illustrate the complex organization of entrepreneurship education as situated social practices. We theorize by employing a practice theory perspective to explore why tensions may be inherent to widely recognized ideals of best practice in experiential entrepreneurship education. This is in contrast to individual learner oriented explanations.

KEYWORDS:

• Entrepreneurship education
• legitimate peripheral participation
• practice theories
• non-business students
• Ethnography
• Entrepreneurial learning
• Situated learning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The questions were meant to inspire practices of ‘cross-appropriation’ and ‘reconfiguration’ following the work of Spinosa, Flores, and Dreyfus (1997). For example: ‘Write down examples of practices that you consider to be good’ ‘Which of these practices could be fruitful in your work?’ ‘How would these practices change the lives of people you address with your work?’.

2. Reference is made to Derek F. Abell’s ‘Three vector model’ which was introduced as a project development tool in the process book. Originally published in Abell, D.F. (1980) Defining the business: the starting point of strategic planning. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.

3. ‘Solutions’ to the problems that the team had identified in their everyday lives (see Figure 1).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Innovation Fund Denmark .