Entrepreneurial Education for the (Collective) Win

By Judy Goldstein

Late last year, at Getting Smart’s New Pathways Convening, I had the opportunity to hear from a group of people whose organizations are changing the way entrepreneurial education is taught and delivered to kids around the country: J.D. LaRock from the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE); Trace Pickering from Iowa Big; Margarita Geleske from Uncharted Learning; Charissa Eggleston from Federal Way Public Schools; and George Raileanu, a student entrepreneur who founded Everyday Medic, a company that provides innovative first-aid solutions. And, as you might imagine of a group of entrepreneurially minded Americans, their missions and stories are simply inspiring.?

I’ll cut to the chase and flip this post upside down a bit. Before I share with you a couple of exciting things that ASA’s counterparts are up to, I’ll give you my conclusion. The reason I’m writing this post is to convince more of you that entrepreneurial education, which at its heart lets kids solve problems that are important to them, is not just an important—but a vital—need for our kids. It’s one of the most powerful tools at our disposal to help young people visualize a lucrative and sustainable future for themselves, but also one that can inspire them to do well and to carve out a path that’s just theirs. Entrepreneurial education uses a “problem-first” model. In other words, it encourages learners to lead with a problem that needs solving, and then come to the realization that they are uniquely positioned to help solve it. Entrepreneurial education is, as one panelist phrased it – “domain-agnostic.” It can and does happen everywhere. And in terms of its benefits, it helps kids build skills, fail safely, develop agility, and so many other things they will need in order to be successful. Perhaps most importantly it helps kids find their true passion.?

Anything we at ASA can do to further the cause of proliferating entrepreneurial education in schools, we’re doing. So – what did I learn during the panel? Here are just a couple of the most inspiring examples I heard:?

Everyday Medic started as a simple first aid kid but expanded to an emergency response training model and an enhanced first aid kid after the realization that 1) there was a lot of gun violence in their community, and 2) emergency first responders often struggle to communicate when languages other than English are spoken. “Our goal is to use a simple translation card to help first responders work when there’s a language barrier. And our goal is to prevent people from dying following shootings. We saw something bad happening and we knew a way to solve it. So, we ended up winning a grant this year, and we’re implementing our “train the trainer” model, putting what we’ve learned into our first aid kids and in the school districts and health classes where we teach, so people know what to do in emergency situations for basic first aid and to stop bleeding.”?

Uncharted Learning is an entrepreneurial education program that asks students to think of the problem they want to solve. From there, they build out teams who rally around a common passion. “It’s like talking to a teenager,” a panelist shared. “If you ask them a question, they’re going to say “yes” or “no” or the opposite of what you think. So, you go at it a different way and instead ask, “What’s something that’s bothering you today?” And by asking that question, you can help them find a way to the answer. We find that learners are tremendously concerned about global problems like climate change. They very naturally gravitate towards wanting to pursue business ideas related to those problems because they are genuinely concerned about the problems they’re hearing about.”?

I said I already gave you my conclusion, but I lied. Here’s the real conclusion of this piece: when entrepreneurial education programming is started early; when it’s inclusive of all kids – not just those with high GPAs or generational advantages; and when it lets kids ideate and lead with a problem that matters to them, then it’s not just kids who thrive. Their families thrive. Their communities thrive. Businesses thrive. And we all win.?

At ASA, we’re beyond proud to support entrepreneurial education to empower the next generation of learners. Click here to learn more about our recently announced strategic alliance with NFTE to expand this kind of programming nationwide!