Follow-up on the training in Brussels March 6-7, 2014

It was great to see you all in Brussels. Thank you for your active participation and for all your positiv feed-back. In this area, we will upload information and files which can help you to achive the targets regarding the national trainings.

"A change is needed!" said Xavier Prats Monné, Deputy Director General, DG Education and Culture, European Commission to the trainers during the event. "If you can imagine a teacher from last century entering some of your classrooms, he would hardly notice any difference". More than 120 teachers from 22 European countries were specially selected to come to Brussels to launch Europe's first Virtual Guide to Entrepreneurial Learning.

Support for entrepreneurship has never been more important than it is now. Europe is facing a situation where, in some countries, the youth unemployment is more than 60%. “There is a need to nurture a culture in which creating jobs is encouraged just as much as  getting a job. We think that young people are ready to rise to the challenge if they get the correct support” was the message from the panel debating entrepreneurship education in Brussels on March 6^th.

Besides contributing to the creation of social enterprise and business start-ups, entrepreneurship education will make young people more employable. Therefore, investing in entrepreneurship education is one of the highest return investmentsthat Europe can make. Entrepreneurial learning for young people can help support skills-training in schools, give students the knowledge needed and the appreciation from the local community, teach them about how to get support and access to financial services and capability, and as a result, they can be able to start and grow their own viable businesses.

Several reports about entrepreneurship outline that teachers are a critical success factor: teachers need the right sort of support in order to be motivated to move into and have a positive approaches to entrepreneurship education; effective teacher training, both initial and continuing; on-going support like tools to exchange good practice, the development of banks of content, tools, methodologies and resources, the establishment of effective support networks.