Students' career interests and entrepreneurship education in a developing country

Abstract

Purpose

Students' career choices and programmes of study are perceived to influence student understanding of many courses. Yet, research attention is limited on entrepreneurship education that is a panacea for unemployment. Thus, this paper aims to assess the influence of students' career interests on students' comprehension of the entrepreneurship curriculum from a developing economy perspective.

Design/methodology/approach

The study adopts a mixed-method approach and explanatory sequential design is used to collect the data from 575 student studying entrepreneurship course in Ghana.

Findings

The results show that there is no statistically significant relationship between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum but a statistically significant relationship between students' programme of study and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum in Ghanaian universities.

Practical implications

The findings imply that the entrepreneurship course should be taught practically. This can be accomplished by creating a virtual enterprise modelled after a successful enterprise. This will help students understand the concepts being taught. Second, students who study different programmes should be taught using different methods. Lastly, students who study non-business-related programmes should be taught using methods that emphasise the basic ideas to aid students' understanding.

Originality/value

This study has made significant contribution by successful adopting the Piaget's cognitive constructivism to the learning of entrepreneurship from a developing country perspective and establish that no statistical relationship exist between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in entrepreneurship education.

Citation

Awaah, F., Okebukola, P., Shabani, J., Arkorful, H. and Addo, D.A. (2023), "Students' career interests and entrepreneurship education in a developing country", Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 148-160. https://doi.org/10.1108/HESWBL-05-2022-0110