IMPACT
Standing out from the Crowd – ENTERPRISE & STEM
Swinburne University of Technology
The Enterprise & STEM resource, targeted at female students in secondary schools was created to assist with the issue of under-participation and underrepresentation of females in the Australian STEM sector. This was achieved through the setting of four key objectives which included creating a series of educational resources including case studies, videos and lesson plans that profiled highly successful enterprising women in STEM. The five case studies and videos feature:
(i) Kim Ellis, Space Lawyer and Scientist
(ii) Elicia Wong, STEM entrepreneur
(iii) Lina Qasem, CEO of ROBOFUN
(iv) Vanessa Doake, former founder of Code Like a Girl
(v) Natasha Mandie, CEO of EM Advisory
The videos have participants from each of the STEM sectors to ensure that examples of women operating within all sectors have been considered. Furthermore, enterprise skills found in STEM subjects have been mapped to the Year 7-10 Victorian secondary school curriculum. Teachers will find case studies, associated lesson plans and videos. There are also activity sheets which provide guidelines for teachers on running classroom activities.
Enterprise education affords students with short-term (i.e. immediate) and long-term benefit both in and out of the classroom. In the short term, enterprise education can positively influence students’ motivation, attendance, retention and connectedness. In the long term, entrepreneurship education at primary and secondary school levels is found to be an effective means of shaping enterprise-related abilities in later life.
Enterprise education has positive impact via:
• Improving school outcomes, motivation for school, attendance, retention, and connectedness
• Enhancing employment opportunities and earnings outcomes in later life
• Improving the likelihood of successfully operating a business
• Increasing desirability of, and anticipation for, entrepreneurship as a career
• Enhancing career prospects, and adaptability to the changing needs of the workforce
The online repository/website can be accessed at
https://www.enterpriseandstem.online
