Support Youth Entrepreneurship, New Study Says

Compelling new evidence from researchers at Harvard University indicate that youth entrepreneurship programs may be particularly effective at keeping students from low-income urban backgrounds on the academic track and can be a significant force in driving them toward high achievement and leadership.

The research, conducted on behalf of the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE), an international nonprofit organization that teaches entrepreneurship to low-income young people, shows that young people who learn about entrepreneurship by participating in its program develop a "success" orientation and are more likely to be focused on becoming professionals and entering the workforce.

Led by Dr. Michael Nakkula, Director of Project IF (Inventing the Future) at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education, the multi-phase study is the first of its kind that seeks to identify the benefits of entrepreneurship education programs such as NFTE, including clarifying the entrepreneurial skills and attitudes that are promoted by such programs and understanding the connection between these skills and attitudes and larger life goals. The study involved data collected from 312 students in the Boston public high school system during the 2001-2002 academic year.

The research suggests that the hands-on, interactive nature of the curriculum holds the capacity to engage students by making learning relevant to their real-world experiences and ambitions. Although ongoing, the preliminary findings reveal that the NFTE students, when compared with a comparison group:

-- Increased their engagement in reading on their own, independently from school assignments

-- Increased their interest in college by 32 percent while the comparison group's interest declined by 17 percent

-- Increased their aspirations for jobs that require more education by 44%, while the comparison group's aspirations were only 10% greater.

-- Expressed a 17 percent increase in their interest in work and professional achievement.

-- Expressed a success orientation. Students increased 56 percent in their "hopes and worries about future success" while the comparison group increased only 12 percent.

Go here to read more.