Evaluation of a Multicultural Approach to Teaching Entrepreneurship: Selected Research Results Within the Framework of the ECMT+ International Project

Abstract

One of the most important challenges in the field of higher education is to educate students about entrepreneurial attitudes and professional competences necessary for working in a multicultural environment in collaboration with a real business environment. Streamlining this process is one of the aims of the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership Project titled Entrepreneurship and Communication in Multicultural Teams (ECMT+). The cognitive purpose of this paper is to explore and evaluate students’ reflections on entrepreneurship teaching in an international and multicultural team. The applied research methods include a pilot quantitative survey using questionnaires and a qualitative research method of a reflective essay among students participating in the two-week Intensive Programme that took place in March 2017 at Karelia University in Finland. Respondents were chosen purposeful and included 48 participants from 14 countries worldwide. They represented seven high education institutions from seven different European countries. The study has been conducted anonymously via the Claroline Connect platform. The purpose of the empirical research was to diagnose the opinions of program participants, among others about new methods of business education they have experienced, diversity of multicultural context and relationships with other team members, their entrepreneurial attitude, and ability to solve problems at designing business solutions in the multicultural team.. Preliminary results appear to present interesting data and may provide a starting point for an in-depth empirical research associated with entrepreneurship in multicultural teams. The study reveals positive effects of applied methods of business education, significant involvement of participants in achieving the goal and gaining new knowledge within the analyzed area.