2008-04-01Staff Report 2 "Subject: Empowering the Nation through Entrepreneurship Education The introduction of Entrepreneurship in the junior secondary curriculum has added another ingredient to the already sizzling recipe of the ETSIP programme. As the programme is designed to contribute to the making of Namibia as a knowledge-based economy, the introduction of this practical subject has been carefully timed. The collaborative effort by NIED, DECOSA, UNAM's CES and UNIDO among others, has led to successful skills training in the teaching of Entrepreneurship as a school subject. For a layman, Entrepreneurship may mean nothing than people trying to waste time. To help the laymen understand why it has been introduced, the following are some of the reasons for its introduction into the curriculum: - Development of human capital by inculcating skills into the youth through life-long learning. - Encouragement of the youth to move away from the ideology of employment-seeking to that of employment-creation. - Instilling values that will help the future generation to exploit business opportunities that would help them to fend for themselves in life and thus doing away with the dependency syndrome in our society. - Encouraging a culture of creativeness and innovativeness among the young generation so that the oars that pedal our country's social and economic development processes can be strengthened. - Removing the negative beliefs associated with running businesses and treating such myths of a stereotypical nature, from the mindsets of our youth. - Making young people believe and understand that if an opportunity does not exist ,it can be created A passing glance at the above reasons justify the introduction of Entrepreneurship into our curriculum. As a developing nation, we are in a lucky position to have introduced Entrepreneurship because it is what is needed to answer the question of competition against economic giants in the world. In an attempt to ensure the smooth introduction of the subject, teachers in all regions received training. During that training, teachers were exposed to various aspects regarding the subject, inter alia: teaching methodologies, content, assessment as well as the new role of all stakeholders in the introduction of the new subject. As a Trainer of Trainers, it was quite exciting to learn about a new dimension regarding the business world. I suppose all those teachers who attended the training are finding it quite exciting to teach the subject. It is now up to the regions to provide remedial support to these teachers in the form of refresher workshops to ensure continuity. Remember the adage: ""If you want to feed a person with fish for the rest of their life, teach them how to fish."" That is what Entrepreneurship is striving to achieve. Viva Entrepreneurship. Alex Kamwi Gwala Trainer of Trainers Ohangwena Region 0812534324 " 2008-04-01Staff Report 2
