ParENTrepreneurs was a 30-month Erasmus+ KA2 project coordinated by Parents International (NL) ESHA’s partner in some projects. Based on the ECVET framework, one of its main aims was to make skills and competences developed through parenting visible and validated. For this, the partnership developed a validation/certification framework as well as guidelines for employers and recommendations for policy. Before validation, participants are offered a training consisting of face-to face training and an additional set of online training modules to make the learning systematic and also obvious for the parents themselves. Feedback from participants since the project ended as well as employers shows that the linking of learning to ECVET points making the certification as a kind of microcredential has proven to be very useful, including it being acknowledged as part of compulsory professional development of teachers.

The project partnership had members from the entrepreneurship scene (MateraHUB (IT), Inova Consulting (UK), Bantani Education (BE)), academia (VAMK (FI) and policy (Junta de Extremadura (ES)). Its focus wass to support parents and caregivers in developing their own and their children’s entrepreneurial mindset and skills; especially, a sense of initiative, self-awareness and self-efficacy, creativity, and developing a growth mindset. The project is built on an evidence-based competence framework footed on the EntreComp that outlines entrepreneurship as a competence where entrepreneurship is understood as value creation where the benefit may be financial but may also be cultural or social.

ParENTrepreneurs is aiming at offering a complex and context-sensitive solution to help parents as the primary (not only first, but also most impacting) educators of their children develop their educator skills to raise resilient children. For this, the project consortium identified parents’ entrepreneurial competence development as a pre-requisite. It has been understood that in case the environment and its actors (in this case parents) are not ready to transfer entrepreneurial competences, skills and knowledge, the community will not be able to start thinking, acting and seeing itself as entrepreneurial. The outcomes of the project can be translated to the context of teachers as well. At the outset, the project defined teachers and school leaders as a secondary target group for need of developing their skills and competences for the necessary competence transfer, too.

The outcomes of the project address individual parents as well as those empowering and training parents. Schools and kindergartens are very important entry points, but other professionals that parents have a trustful relationship with also support outreach to parents who are open to building their own competences and thus becoming on the one hand more entrepreneurial and resilient themselves, and on the other hand better educators of entrepreneurial children.

The programme is based on an evidence review that was aiming at defining parent entrepreneurial competences as well as entrepreneurship educator competences of parents. A competence framework, based on the EntreComp, has been developed defining parentrepreneurial competences in 10 domains and 4 progression levels also linked to the developmental levels of children. This complex framework forms the basis of a action learning programme, a combination of face-to-face and self-directed online learning for those at progression levels 1 to 3. It is accompanied by a validation tool to make not only learning visible, but also acknowledge skills and competence development via this non-formal training. The training was piloted in two phases, first with an international audience, and then in national Barcamps in contextualised, localised versions. For parents at progression level 4 – having high levels at all competences and a drive to support and train others – a handbook is being delivered. This is accompanied by an interactive social learning platform with a growing library of resources and a built-in social interaction platform for peer support. A competence validation framework is also developed in collaboration with employers to support the recognition of entrepreneurial competences acquired through parenting for better employability.

The direct impact on the parents participating in these trainings is partly intangible (higher level of educator motivation, awareness of their role as well as their own competences) and partly tangible (knowledge acquisition, posterior use of the techniques learnt for their daily practices as educators as well as in their professional lives in various areas of the economy). The local/regional community around each participating group is also more aware of the need to work on new approaches towards entrepreneurship. The online and internet-based tools developed in the project have the potential to multiply the number of families reached as the social learning platform and social media are two powerful tools make the engagement of people from any part of Europe and beyond. This impact is enhanced by the availability of the tools in languages of countries with relatively low levels of English: Italian and Spanish (as well as Finnish).

Building on the cornerstone of society, the family, a new vision for entrepreneurship is created, making new generations of parents as educators aware of the “entrepreneurial way” for their own future careers as well as that of their children, and of the need to be proactive in life. It motivates local community actors to build a local entrepreneurship hub, also raising local/regional awareness of the need to train any professional in entrepreneurship competences and adapt lifelong training programmes to it. It also supports the creation or enhancement of a positive vision of local entrepreneurs. It also creates a local/regional network of professionals and dedicated parents that foster entrepreneurship.

The wider benefits of the project is first of all on the local communities participants belong to. By having community members aware of their entrepreneurial competences as well as the importance of them in life and for the future of their children, they can influence local public and create and understanding of a new approach towards entrepreneurship as well as the way education reaches young people. It subsequently raises awareness of the need to change lenses through entrepreneurs and business are seen with an attitude-shift towards commitment to education provision and a positive image of entrepreneurship. The fact that the project is mainly built on digital technology creates the link between entrepreneurship and the utilisation of opportunities provided by the digital age.

Other parents and educators, such as teachers and school leaders, are to be inspired by those who received training in “parentrepreneurship” to develop their own competences and to interact with more proactive and more entrepreneurial parents and educators.

The project is creating a long-term change first of all by the building of a community of parents and educators who are devoted to support the entrepreneurial transformation of further generations of parents and other educators. This is amplified by policy makers operating in a community aware of the importance of entrepreneurship for all, thus being able to create a policy environment more supportive of entrepreneurship and enhancing it. Children and young people educated by direct or indirect beneficiaries of the programme will become more entrepreneurial citizens of Europe in the future being aware that they should be able to have a proactive attitude towards life and an enhanced sense of initiative. By the validation procedure employers as well as the adult education and VET sectors and trainers in these fields awareness of skills and competences of educators acquired informally and non-formally. Furthermore, these sectors benefit from the development of innovative tools and techniques to work on entrepreneurial competences. By utilising digital technology for mutual learning and mutual support of educators, an international self-supportive community is built, resulting in a snowballing effect.