The Erasmus Plus project "Young Entrepreneurs on Start!” will be conducted in the partnership of six secondary schools from Poland, Greece, Spain, Slovakia, Germany and Turkey. The aim of the project is to cooperate and share the learning and teaching knowledge and experiences in the field of entrepreneurship and thus, to help students enter the European labour market equipped with competences and skills obtained during their work in the school Entrepreneurship Clubs, as well as during their meetings with local and foreign entrepreneurs and mentors. Our project focuses on promoting entrepreneurship, sense of initiative, creativity and managing skills among its participants, so that they are sufficiently equipped with necessary knowledge and skills, preparing them for their working life and requirements of the labour market. Before starting our project studies, we held a preparatory visit in Spain with the participation of contact persons from Poland, Turkey, Spain and Slovakia. During this visit we discussed the main goals of our project and designed basic guidelines which became a framework for our later work on the application form. We began to search for some new partners, as well, using especially the eTwinning site. The project is designed for a two year period while we will cooperate both virtually and personally in order to reach our goals: in every participating school there will be a Young Entrepreneurs' Club created where the students and teachers will work together and study on the project topics. The Clubs will closely cooperate using all the possible ways of communication (social networks, the internet, online calls, common websitew). The students and teachers will also have an opportunity to work together during 4 Learning/Teaching/Training short-term student exchanges (approx. 23 students at each). During them, the participants will have an opportunity to study on the given topics, to practice their foreign language skills, to work in mixed teams as well as to visit the local businesses, to talk to the local entrepreneurs and to compare their knowledge and experience. The students and teachers’ work and studies in the given countries will concern the following topics: Creating a business plan, Human resources, Marketing and Communication competences, time and team management. There will be two transnational meetings for the coordinators held during the project duration. They will review the general schedule of the project, clarify the evaluation criteria for the implementation and assessment of the project, its final products and the contribution of the project to the students' key competences. The management team will also discuss the distribution of the project tasks among all the participating countries, all the activities (including surveys to assess the students‘ progress and monitoring all the products) and the means of its dissemination. The project coordinators together with all the participating teachers will be in charge of the formal course of the project and the rest of tasks is completed by the students. Thanks to this multicultural project we will be able to lead our students to international cooperation to widen their horizons in the field of entrepreneurship, mainly to provide them not only with the theoretical background but also with the practical experience in this field. Through their cross-country cooperation and personal experience of the real local businesses, the students and teachers will benefit from the participation at the project, not to mention the cultural and cross-cultural awareness that will enable them to broaden their minds and capabilities, as well as their performance, communication and language skills. The project will be beneficial not only for the students but also for the teaching staff. They will be in constant communication, discussing the project issues, sharing their experiences in the project topics and cooperating with all the partners when preparing the basic project content. They will have to work with a set of indicators of achievement, both quantitative and qualitative, which they will use to measure both the project quality and the fulfilment of the objectives and results. Among the basic results, there are expected tangible and intangible outcomes: functional Entrepreneurs' Clubs in all participating schools, consisting of students and teachers, a webpage with all the information about the participating business clubs and our common project results (e.g. business plans, posters and other promotional materials, team-building activities, instructional videos, etc.), a detailed guidebook for the future entrepreneurs, panel discussions with professionals and experts and all the outcomes obtained during them (photos, students’ reports, etc.) All the possible problems will be discussed and everything done throughout the project will be uploaded to our website. All partners will be in contact, providing each other with necessary support.
The Erasmus+ project "Young Entrepreneurs on Start!” was conducted in the partnership of five secondary schools from Poland, Greece, Spain, Slovakia and Germany, with help, cooperation and expertise from local companies, entrepreneurs and trainers. The aim of the project was to cooperate and share the learning and teaching knowledge and experiences in the field of entrepreneurship and thus, to help students enter the European and national labour markets equipped with competences and skills obtained during their work at the learning, teaching and training events (workshops, lectures, seminars, plenary sessions, mock job interviews and roleplaying real-life situations conducted by entrepreneurs and experts on the subjects). Our project focused on promoting entrepreneurship, sense of initiative, creativity and managing skills among its participants, to sufficiently equip them with necessary knowledge and skills, preparing them for their working life and requirements of the labour market. The project was designed for a two year period, while we cooperated both personally and virtually in order to reach our objectives. Project participants took part in 4 learning, teaching and training events, focused on 4 main subtopics: C1 - Germany, 01.2016 - Creating a businessplan. Participants learned how to create a viable businessplan, through workshops, lectures and international groupwork, being coached by real-life entrepreneurs and experts on the topic. After that they prepared their own businessplans, presented it publicly and received feedback/critique from experts. C2 - Greece, 06.2016 - Teamwork ad teambuilding. Participants learned how to build proper relationships, especially in a workplace, and how to establish healthy group dynamics through a series of lectures, workshops, seminars and role-playing. C3 - Slovakia, 10.2016 - Human resources. Participants learned how to use international employment tools (Europass CV, covering letter etc.) and how to prepare for a successful job interview They went through recruitment processes in various local companies, submitting their job applications, taking part in mock job interviews and receiving feedback and constructive criticism. C4 - Spain, 02.2017 - Marketing. Participants learned the teory and practice of a successful marketing campaign of a product or a venture, particularly focusing on online marketing. They created marketing plans and tools for their own enterprises under guidance from experts in the subject and presented them, receiving feedback. During the whole project, the participants had opportunity to study on the given topics, to practice their foreign language skills, to work in mixed teams as well as to learn from and visit local businesses and entrepreneurs and to derive from their knowledge and experience. In every participating school we created a Young Entrepreneurs' Club, where the students and teachers worked together and studied on the project topics, teaching other project participants. The Clubs closely cooperated using all the possible ways of communication (social networks, online calls, project website). There were also two transnational project meetings for the coordinators held during the project duration. They reviewed the general schedule of the project, clarified the evaluation criteria for the implementation and assessment of the project, its final products and the contribution of the project to the students' key competences. Thanks to international cooperation, project participants were able to widen their knowledge and horizons in the field of entrepreneurship, not only with the theoretical background but also with practical experience in this field. Through their cross-country cooperation and personal experience of the real businesses, the students and teachers benefitted from the participation at the project, not to mention the cultural and cross-cultural awareness that enabled them to broaden their minds and capabilities, as well as their performance, communication and language skills. The project was beneficial for the teaching staff, who shared good practices and improved their skills in teaching project-related subjects and foreign language competences. Also entrepreneurs and businesses involved in the project had a chance to present themselves internationally and test their training procedures/resources management. Many local educational and cultural organizations took part in project activities ( e.g Entrepreneurship Days organized in partner schools) and were targets of dissemination activities, receiving project's tangible outputs. The tangible outputs of our project were: A Guidebook for Young Entrepreneurs, Multilingual Dictionary of Entrepreneurship Terms, lesson plans covering project's topics, instructional presentations, main project website with all the information about the project and its outputs, posters, videos, other promotional materials, photos, meeting reports, evaluation report etc.