Linking methods to outcomes: A multi-course mixed-method study of the effects of active and passive pedagogy on entrepreneurial intentions

This sequential mixed method study explores how pedagogy affects students' entrepreneurial intentions. It outlines how positivist and constructivist educational paradigms are the basis of conventional and entrepreneurial pedagogy, and how these paradigms manifest themselves in entrepreneurship course learning objectives and teaching strategies. This overview engenders a novel coding scheme that supports a double-coder qualitative content analysis of seventeen entrepreneurship course syllabi, from twelve universities in eight countries. The coding results are then quantified and incorporated into a hierarchical multiple regression analysis, using data from a pre-post course student survey (N = 232). Contrary to expectations, teaching strategies across the international sample remain relatively conventional, particularly assessments, even for courses that have mostly entrepreneurial course learning objectives. Furthermore, the results did not demonstrate any effect of pedagogy type on students' entrepreneurial intentions. From all control variables, only ‘pre-course entrepreneurial intentions’ and ‘study level’ are related to (an increase in) entrepreneurial intentions. Therefore, we recommend that universities target more mature students and do not rely on stand-alone entrepreneurship courses to instill aspirations of entrepreneurship among students. Instead, universities should strive to embed a more constructivist educational approach more widely throughout their curricula.