Principals as Entrepreneurs for Enterprise in Education?

Author(s):

Jaana Nehez(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2011

Network:

26. Educational Leadership

Format:

Paper

Session Information

26 SES 06 A,

Paper Session

Time:

2011-09-14

15:00-16:30

Room:

JK 26/140,G, 38

Chair:

Helen Wildy

Contribution

Over the past two decades one of the questions in educational system in many European countries, including Sweden, has been how to develop young people´s entrepreneurial behaviors, attributes and skills to prepare them for life. Entrepreneurial learning, entrepreneurship and enterprise in education are now common notions in Swedish schools. Despite this the objective about pupils taking initiative and using power to act seems far away especially in big, complex organized upper secondary schools. It is confirmed that principals have an important role in this, but there is a need for further research about the principal´s role.

Since entrepreneurship in education is emphasized in the new national policy documents for Swedish schools the aim of this study is to contribute to knowledge and discussion in this quite un-researched field.

If it is entrepreneurial individuals that we want, then we need to know more about how to create conditions for entrepreneurship in education and the principal´s role. This study focus on how principals create conditions for entrepreneurship in education and has an action research approach. Supporting the participants to improve their practice is another aim. The research questions are:

What actions distinguish principal´s working process creating conditions for entrepreneurship in education?
What factors seem to be central in principal´s work creating conditions for entrepreneurship in education?

Theoretically the study rests on socio constructional perspective

Method

The participants are a team of eleven upper secondary school principals who asked for a collaboration research project concerning an improvement work of creating conditions for entrepreneurship in education. The design is a case study. The empirical material consists of researcher narratives from observations of eight work meetings during September 2009 and April 2010 as well as transcripts from three focus group conversations with the principals during February and April 2010 about the initiation of entrepreneurship in education and focus group interviews during August and October 2010 with the principals about their working process. The observed meetings lasted for two to seven hours apart from one shorter meeting and the conversations and interviews lasted for approximately one hour. During the research process the empirical material have been read several times with the purpose to systematically and continually give the participants feedback to make visible for them what is going on in their process. But a deeper analyze started when all the observations were done. Qualitative content analysis based on Graneheim & Lundman (2004) is used as a method for analyzing the empirical material concerning both questions. The first question is analyzed, but the second remains.

Expected Outcomes

About the principal´s actions they tend to re-organize for example schedules and staff to promote entrepreneurship in education and initiate entrepreneurship in education among the staff while they are trying to make sense what entrepreneurship in education is and how it can be organize. At the same time they prioritize organizing above making sense and they prioritize trying to understand by themselves before trying to get their staff to understand what entrepreneurship is. Analyzing what factors seem to be central in principal´s work creating conditions for entrepreneurship in education will hopefully give some answers to why principal´s act like they do. For example the principals worry about resistance from the teachers, but one might wonder if they do not create resistance by not inviting the teachers to their own process. The principal´s intentions about distributed leadership does not really fit with the reality, what they do.

References

Graneheim U.H. & Lundman B. (2004). "Qualitative content analysis in nursing research: concepts, procedures and measures to achieve trustworthiness". In Nurse Education Today, 24:105-112. Johannisson B. & Madsén T. (1997). I entreprenörskapets tecken – en studie av skolning i förnyelse. Stockholm: Närings- och handelsdepartementet, Ds 1997:3. Kemmis S. (1985). “Action research and the politics of reflection”. In Boud D, Keogh R & Walker D. (Eds). Reflection. Turning experience into learning. London: Kogan Page. Kemmis S. (2010). “Phronēsis, experience and the primacy of praxis.” In Kinsella A. and Pitman A. (Eds.) Phronēsis as professional knowledge. Rotterdam: Sense. Leffler E. (2006). Företagsamma elever. Diskurser kring entreprenörskap och företagsamhet i skolan. Umeå: Umeå universitet. OECD/CERI (1989) Towards an ”enterprising” culture a challenge for education and training. Regeringskansliet (2009). Strategi för entreprenörskap inom utbildningsområdet. http://www.regeringen.se/content/1/c6/12/69/09/22b6e680.pdf Scheerens J. (Eds.) (2009) Teachers´Professional Development: Europe in international comparison. A secondary analysis based on the TALIS dataset. Enschede: University of Twente. Wingård B. (1998). Att vara rektor och kvinna. Uppsala: Uppsala universitet.

Author Information

Jaana Nehez (presenting / submitting)

Halmstad University

Department of teacher education

Helsingborg

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