THE ROLE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT

Phd. Student Paul IVAN“Stefan cel Mare” University, Suceava (ROMANIA)

THE ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND THE ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION IN ROMANIA

In 2011 the World Bank placed Romania on the 56th place out of 183 economies analyzed in terms of ease of doing business.

Regarding the opening a new business we find that this operation takes 10 days and requires resources of to 2.6% of income per capita, Romania occupying the 44th position in the hierarchy (indicators: time, cost, procedures and capital minimum).

The "paying taxes" indicator gives rank 151, with 113 payments per year, amounting to 44.9% of income and 222 hours required.

In the last few years in Romania we can see a positive development of entrepreneurship thanks to several very different factors among we can mention: various grant programs that encourage new

business development the public policies that are periodically providing

benefits to new and small entrepreneurs the private funding (business angels) the theorists and successful entrepreneurs who

promoted and introduced the concept of entrepreneurship.

Based on the frame-school education the entrepreneurship education is studied at the tenth grade at all branches, profiles and specializations, with a budget of one hour a week.

Syllabus comply with the rules and it’s focused on developing entrepreneurial and networking skills in the economic and social environment for allowing the students to use effective their potential and, in perspective, to manage effective their business.

Also 70% of the 56 state universities offer bachelor programs in business administration and management and 73% offer master programs in these domains.

However, both the undergraduate and the graduate programs are relatively new in terms of entrepreneurship education.

Since the Romanian national education system does not always succeed in full development of entrepreneur spirit of their graduates, this task is substituted by adult education which must complete and enrich the entrepreneurial skills of those.

Lifelong education covers all types of training through education and training, ensuring equal opportunities by for all, especially for vulnerable groups.

Entrepreneurship courses should not be seen as simple courses that ends with a note, but as a permanent way of thinking or attitude.

THE FEMALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN ROMANIA

In terms of entrepreneurial motivation, a 2009 study of the Center for Entrepreneurship and Business Research (CEBR) on female entrepreneurship in Romania shows that the strongest three reasons for men are: the desire of making money the fact that they always wanted their own business the wish to improve their quality of life

These are the same regarding the motivation for women entrepreneurship but we can see that unlike men, women give more importance to these factors. In addition to money the women seem to be more motivated by the opportunity to improve the quality of life and the dream of their own business is a much stronger motivation for women. The same study shows that being entrepreneur for follow a family tradition is a stronger motivation for women than for men and also the contribution to society through their company or companies.

PROGRAMS FOR SUPPORTING THE FEMALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP

The 2005 – 2011 national multiannual program for developing entrepreneurial culture among women managers from SME’s sector

The program for developing the entrepreneurial skills among young people and facilitating their access to funding – START

The 2010 – 2014 Government Strategy for improvement and business development

The 2007 – 2013 Human Resources Development Operational Programe (POSDRU). The general objective of POSDRU can be divided into a number of specific objectives:

promoting quality education and initial and continuing training, including higher education and research

promoting entrepreneurial culture and improving quality and productivity facilitating insertion of young and long term unemployed into labor market the development of a modern, flexible and inclusive labor market promoting insertion / reinsertion into the labor market of inactive people,

including rural areas improving public employment services facilitating access of vulnerable groups to education and the labor market

BEST PRACTICES IN FEMALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT

The “EVA – The Capitalization of Women’s Entrepreneurship Era“ Project

Overall objective: to promote equal opportunities and to facilitate access to employment for 1400 women belonging from vulnerable groups of four development regions of Romania (Central, South Muntenia Nord Est, Bucharest-Ilfov) through specific training programs in order to acquire entrepreneurial skills and to develop their business and qualifications required on the market.

ACTIVITIES Promoting entrepreneurship and awareness of women towards entrepreneurial

culture trough regional campaigns; Assessing the current state of female entrepreneurship in Romania and gender

barriers in business and employment. The study of female entrepreneurship in Romania and gender barriers in the development of entrepreneurship will be made using desk research and physical and online opinion surveys. The identifying of business opportunities and training needs for women from the target group will be made using 20 interviewers, 2,500 questionnaires completed by selected representative sample, 100 online questionnaires on the project portal, all resulting in a study on the situation of female entrepreneurship in Romania and gender barriers in starting businesses and in 4 regional workshops to present and debate the survey;

Eliminating gender stereotypes in society and in media through courses for 20 experts and 60 media operators in selected regions;

Providing training to develop entrepreneurial skills for at least 1,000 women for starting own businesses for at least 100 of them;

Providing qualified services for 400 women from vulnerable groups for easier integration into employment or business start;

Assistance and counseling through support services for women who want to start their own business, promote active learning, lifelong learning, transfer of knowledge and best practices from European countries and developing of guides with good practices during the project.

The exchange facilitating and integration of best practices will be achieved through study visits and documentation, organized by transnational partner about best practices and female entrepreneurship success stories and trough promoting the social inclusion of vulnerable groups of women.

There will be counseled 500 women in starting businesses and 400 women in finding a job.

The project portal will also provide assistance and advice to a number of 600 women.

Assistance and counseling activities will therefore contribute to the creation of new businesses and therefore jobs and will increase the employment rates and labor market integration of vulnerable people.

At the end of the project the evaluation of the project will be disseminated through a workshop to present the achievements of the project and through an international conference with the participation of transnational partner.

At present the project was successfully received and is implemented in four regions of Romania, being in the stage of providing training programs and consultancy services.

CONCLUSIONS

Entrepreneurship is expected to become one of the most important areas of the Romanian economy and not only it. Also we can see that despite a system of education which is developing at a lower rate than the actual trends, there is interest from other stakeholders to cover the training needs, both in general and vulnerable groups.

The implementation of several projects that will encourage female entrepreneurship will bring very important benefits for business environment (use of entrepreneurial skills and development of new business) and to society (reducing gender discrimination, facilitating access of vulnerable groups to labor market).

It is important that other stakeholders (not only women) to receive entrepreneurship training because very often some viable business ideas are not implemented due to lack of knowledge and information in the field.