When Young People Become Entrepreneurs

ECO NET: Networking at the School Level

They establish companies, sell organic products, tourist packages, real estate or telephone connections, develop business plans and marketing strategies, conclude bank transactions and pay taxes. Payments are simulated and goods are delivered in cyberspace. The pupils enjoy managing a variety of business operations – even though it all happens on a virtual level.

Acting out all the processes of a real business enterprise in the context of so-called “training firms” has become a fixed element of commercial school education in numerous countries of South Eastern Europe. The training firm learning method is highly practice-oriented and fosters entrepreneurial thinking. In addition, this special teaching method promotes the acquisition of key competences such as personal initiative, the ability to work in a team and intercultural sensitivity, all of which are becoming increasingly important in the modern working
world, including South Eastern Europe. In the context of the ECO NET¹ project, KulturKontakt Austria has supported the introduction of the training firm learning method in the countries of South Eastern Europe since 2001. The basis for training firm learning is provided by networks – at both the national and the international level. The training firm concept itself only functions through networking: the market is simulated through trading between virtual companies. Central elements of the ECO NET project are therefore the active exchange between training firms and the establishment of the necessary networks. So-called service centres ensure that the training firm network remains active at the national level, for example by maintaining a national company register, managing virtual national and international monetary transactions and organising national training firm fairs.  In order to network the service centres with one another and make it easier for the individual persons operating them to become acquainted, regional meetings are held on a regular basis; the most recent of these took place at the end of November 2010 in Vienna. This meeting focussed on the establishment of a regular calendar of regional training firm fairs by opening up national fairs to training firms from neighbouring countries.  Regional and international fairs not only promote “turnover”, they also raise the participants’ interest in the countries where other training firms are based and enable the persons involved to learn from, with, and about each other – and this applies not only to the pupils. The fairs give teachers, principals and ministry representatives the opportunity to exchange their experiences regarding the introduction of the training firm learning method in their respective education systems on a regular basis.

KKA, Editorial Staff

¹ ECO NET is subsidised by the Austrian Development Agency and the Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture.