Title: The effects of entrepreneurship education - does gender matter?

Authors: Vegard Johansen; Lene Foss

Addresses: Eastern Norway Research Institute, Box 223, 2601 Lillehammer, Norway ' University of Tromsø, N-9019 Tromsø, Norway

Abstract: This article asks whether entrepreneurship education have the same impact on women and men with regard to perceptions of business skills, career preferences and belief in local business opportunities. We examine the company programme (CP), a programme taught to 250,000 secondary school pupils in 37 European countries. The data includes interviews with 1,187 24 to 25 years old in Norway, and half of the sample had formerly participated in CP. Controlling for competing explanations, CP has a positive impact on women's perception of business skills, but no impact on male's perceptions of business skills. CP has a positive impact on men's preference for self-employment, but no impact on women's career preference. Finally, CP had no impact on belief in local business opportunities. Females are underrepresented vis-à-vis males on all dimensions investigated whether they have participated in CP or not. CP ought to be adjusted to have an even stronger influence on women.

Keywords: entrepreneurship education; gender; company programme; pupils; secondary schools; Junior Achievement-Young Enterprise; Norway; business skills; career preferences; self-employment; business opportunities; logistic regression analysis; control group design; secondary education.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESB.2013.056889

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, 2013 Vol.20 No.3, pp.255 - 271

Published online: 30 Apr 2014 *

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