WHAT ARE THEY TALKING ABOUT WHEN THEY TALK ABOUT ENTREPRENEURSHIP? EXPLORING STUDENTS' UNDERSTANDING OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN EDUCATIONAL SETTINGS.

This paper explores students' preconceptions about entrepreneurship. The sample consists of 387 students from five educational disciplines. To discuss their understandings in relation to established understandings of entrepreneurship, the analysis was based on the entrepreneurship themes identified in Gartner (1990). The result shows that when students talk about entrepreneurship, they focus on entrepreneurial behavior, innovation and uniqueness, rather than value- and organization creation. The students also understand entrepreneurship as cooperation, hence contribute to accelerate the concept in a more multidimensional and including direction. These insights have implications for how entrepreneurship education can be organized in a more student-centered manner, and suggest that educators can enhance learning processes by concidering students' preconceptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]