European arts and humanities students (A&H) face challenges with accessing graduate level employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. These courses typically do not have a direct route to the job market, reflected in higher unemployment and lower salaries. There can be a lack of knowledge from academics about aligning subject expertise with wider industry need as well as a lack of recognition by businesses of the wider benefits and skill sets of A&H graduates.Dedicated support in HEIs for entrepreneurial activity has been mainly focused on business, economics and ICT faculties (UBI). A&H Students come from a very different starting point, with education and skills that do not meet industry need in an obvious way. Therefore, a fresh approach is needed to develop a tailored A&H entrepreneurship model that improves the long-term entrepreneurial prospects for A&H students.The AHEH alliance will:- Bring together 14 partners from across 7 EU member states to improve the entrepreneurial capacity of A&H students. - Jointly research, design, test and disseminate an innovative programme of entrepreneurial training for A&H staff/ students aligned with the EntreComp Competence Framework. This builds upon partners’ prior experience of EU-funded enterprise projects.- Have HEIs, businesses and stakeholders working together to champion the value of A&H students to a wider audience and ensure that industry need is reflected in the training programmes. - Create 7 new A&H Entrepreneurship Hubs situated in partner faculties. These will be the specialist conduits for permanently improving the entrepreneurial skill-sets of A&H staff and students as well as a template for wider exploitation.- Create a website that will complement the 7 Hubs as an ongoing resource-base for disseminating/exploiting outputs. These include:- 3 training programmes: HEI, A&H Students, Businesses- 3 manuals: Trainers, Users, AHEH Management- 2 contextual reports: Academic & Business
1.Better align HEI entrepreneurship training to EntreComp. Create a training programme to up-skill HEI staff, embed delivery & translation within Arts & Humanities (A&H) faculties via dedicated Hubs2.Foster business/HEI collaboration to meet stakeholder needs, improve understanding of entrepreneurship & expand knowledge exchange & RD&I. 3.Foster business innovation through engagement with A&H students4.Develop & mentor A&H students through AHEH 5.Improve student entrepreneurial ability
The fundamental aim of AHEH is to improve the long-term prospects of our Arts and Humanities graduates and to equip them with the tools and confidence they need to succeed. Through a comprehensive programme of activities, we collaboratively researched a perceived skills gap between academia and business to inform the development and pilot-testing of an innovative training programme, tailored to the specific needs, sensibilities and learning style preferences of HEI arts and humanities students.
<< Background >> The fundamental aim of AHEH is to improve the long-term prospects of our Arts and Humanities graduates and to equip them with the tools and confidence they need to succeed. Through a comprehensive programme of activities, we collaboratively researched a perceived skills gap between academia and business to inform the development and pilot-testing of an innovative training programme, tailored to the specific needs, sensibilities and learning style preferences of HEI arts and humanities students. << Objectives >> 1.Better align HEI entrepreneurship training to EntreComp. Create a training programme to up-skill HEI staff, embed delivery & translation within Arts & Humanities (A&H) faculties via dedicated Hubs2.Foster business/HEI collaboration to meet stakeholder needs, improve understanding of entrepreneurship & expand knowledge exchange & RD&I. 3.Foster business innovation through engagement with A&H students4.Develop & mentor A&H students through AHEH 5.Improve student entrepreneurial ability << Implementation >> Research to ensure alignment with training needs specific to A&H. Inc. surveys, literature review, case studies & interviews. This informed the development of AHEH challenge-based training programme, reflecting preferred active learning style identified. Partners collaborated with stakeholders to film challenges for learners. Training was pilot-tested & evaluated at national & EU level to enable further refinement. Enterprise partner engagement was invaluable to give ‘in the moment’ feedback. << Results >> •Multi-method research activity & contextual review report•Training programme, framework, resources and trainer & user manuals •Pilot training at EU & national level & reports•AHEH online platform, contents, platform map & manual•Webinar series•7 Entrepreneurship Hubs for A&H students in partner HEIs•Externally-set challenges•Dissemination assets, resources & report•Exploitation plan & manual for Hubs•Quality manual & reports•Project Management reports/agreements