An international qualification that has just been launched aims to give students access to further opportunities and facilitate their transition from education to entrepreneurship or employment.
The Entrepreneurial Skills Pass (ESP) runs in 26 countries and certifies students between the ages of 15 and 19 who have had a practical entrepreneurship experience and gained the necessary knowledge, skills and competences to start a business or be successfully employed.
The ESP was launched during the Junior Achievement – Young Enterprise (JA-YE) Europe Company of the Year Competition in Tallinn, Estonia.
Students involved in the ESP benefit from a practical entrepreneurial experience, as they learn to take innovative ideas from inception to reality, develop entrepreneurial and financial literacy skills and meet and interact with experienced people from the business sector.
The ESP requires the completion of a mini-company experience (one school year), a self-assessment tool (pre-/mid-/post-test) and an online examination of business, economic and financial knowledge.
Giving students a standardised form of recognition of their entrepreneurial skills and competences provides them with a competitive advantage when entering the job market. At the same time, employers recognising the ESP benefit from a certified standard that meets their requirements for qualified and committed staff with basic business skills.
Entrepreneurship education has been given top billing by the European Commission in the last few years. It was stated in the Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan that “investing in entrepreneurship education is one of the highest return investments Europe can make… whether or not they go on to create businesses or social enterprises, young people who benefit from entrepreneurial learning develop business knowledge and essential skills and attitudes including creativity, initiative, tenacity, teamwork, understanding of risk and a sense of responsibility”.
(JA-YE) Europe, Europe’s largest provider of entrepreneurship education programmes, joined forces with the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber (KWO), CSR Europe and the Danish Foundation for Entrepreneurship-Young Enterprise (FFE-YE) to respond to this need and take a step further. The project is co-funded by the European Commission.
Junior Achievement Young Enterprise Malta is identified through its popular Company Programme. From the next scholastic year, students participating in this mini-company programme will be given the opportunity to sit for this online exam.
JA-YE Europe CEO Caroline Jenner said: “It is imperative to raise young people’s awareness of their entrepreneurial potential while they are still in school. The ESP challenges them in new ways and builds confidence. Private sector partners seeking enterprising new recruits see the ESP as a great addition to any young person’s skills portfolio. It’s a forward-looking initiative aimed at boosting the long-term impact of Europe’s entrepreneurship education efforts.”
The Entrepreneurial Skills Pass ran as pilot programme during the 2013-2014 school year, with the participation of almost 2,000 students from 15 countries.
For more information, visit http://entrepreneurialskillspass.eu/ or contact JA-YE Malta on 2124 4991 or info@youngenterprise.org.mt.