DARE - Because Entrepreneurs Do

At school my teachers always asked their students to become doctors, engineers, civil servants but never entrepreneurs.

In fact, the word ‘entrepreneurship’ was never a part a part of their lexicon. However, I had heard a thoughtful teacher scold a student one day: “If you do not study today, you will have no other option but to open a retail shop when you grow up.” Thank God! If not intentionally, at least accidentally, the teacher was kindly suggesting that entrepreneurship was the last resort of the poor student. I don’t know what became of that student but if Goddess Saraswati blessed the words of the teacher that day, he must be out there following into the footsteps of Big Bazaar’s Kishore Biyani or Subhiksha’s R Subramanian.

Have things changed now? To find out, I shot the question to a small group of school-going children (12-14 year age bracket) but more or less the same answers boomeranged. They all want to become engineers and doctors with a few exceptions who want to become models, actors and journalists. Why not entrepreneurs? They pleaded ignorance to the word itself. But when I simplified it and asked how about “starting your own business”, their was some nodding but a lot of uncertainty.

Unfortunately, entrepreneurship seems to be a dreaded word, a kind of a taboo that neither parents nor teachers want to discuss with their children. It would be interesting to find out how many families seriously consider entrepreneurship as a career prospect for their children? How many teachers pitch the question to their students and prod them to think of having their own business some day?

At a roundtable organized by TiE Kolkata recently, a member of the panel wanted entrepreneurship to be made part of the school curricula. To this, another member guessed that the CBSE board had already introduced it at the Intermediate level. I doubt if making entrepreneurship a subject will be of any help. This would only make students mug up the books for scoring pass marks. Our goal should be to make this an obvious choice for our young generation and not make them run away from it.

I think, following activities at schools would make it interesting:

1. Their should be Start-up Clubs where students should be asked to think of a business they might want to start. They should be asked to do some research to find out what it takes to get into a business of their choice.
2. Field trips to factory shop floors would give students some idea as to how things work on the ground.
3. Our schools would be doing a big favor to all of us by ignoring bureaucrats and politicians when it comes to selecting chief guests for their annual day functions. Instead, they should warmly welcome entrepreneurs to inspire the younger lot.
4. If Lalu Prasad Yadav could be part of the curriculum, why not Narayana Murthy or Kiran Mazumdar Shaw or G R Gopinath? Let the students know how they made it big without muscle or money power.
5. Organizing symposia and debates on entrepreneurship would also do good.
Share your thoughts:

1. Do you think entrepreneurship should be made part of the school curricula?
2. How best can schools and parents contribute to promote entrepreneurship?