nir-vana innovation network

Created in 1991, the French non-profit association dedicated to enhancing and supporting entrepreneurial projects, has been working in the North of France providing :
• Support and training to entrepreneurs involved in creative projects or acquiring an existing business (retailers, craftsmen, liberal professionals).
• Advice and networking opportunities.
• Entrepreneurship awareness raising in schools and local communities.
• Business incubator services that allow project leaders to test their business in a real environment.
The regional office is part of a national network of business support organisations.

Encouraging entrepreneurship at school represents a complementary activity to the other missions of the association. Over the years, it has progressively built a range of tools and actions to instill a spirit of entrepreneurship in pupils. Having earned recognition form the French Ministry of Education, this range now comprises 8 tools.

The French association is convinced that entrepreneurship is a key competence to be developed from an early age but also that the most effective ways to promote entrepreneurial mindset and skills is through learning by doing.

This is why the team has decided to launch an initiative in secondary schools and has develop a brand new digital tool dedicated to young people between 8 and 12. It gives them the opportunity to develop their entrepreneurial knowledge, skills and attitudes by experimenting the different steps of an entrepreneurial adventure:
• The pupils create a project that resolves a problem or answers a need identified in their local environment.
• Thanks to several workshops pupils discover the steps to create a project: finding the idea, gathering information, preparing the action plan, obtaining financing, designing communication supports and launching an event.

It also supports the secondary school teachers managing entrepreneurial projects in the classroom.

The solution is « turnkey » and is made up of :
1. On-line educational resources that are fun and motivational to help teachers run class projects
2. Access to the digital platform
3. A box featuring evaluation tools that offer encouragement to pupils (pride table, messages that challenge and reward pupils, inspirational posters, etc.) and that can be used in the classroom throughout the year to follow-up on the milestones of the project
4. Personalised training and coaching to teachers to prepare each step of the educational and entrepreneurial journey:
• Discovering the solution and learning how it works
• Presenting the educational workshops and the different steps of the process. The teachers take part in the project themselves: finding an entrepreneurial idea, exploring the chronological poster…
• Using the evaluation tools: teachers encourage pupils to be aware of the quality of their work and to be proud of their achievements.

The tool exists in French and in English. The French association is looking for partners in Europe and beyond to deploy it and is open to collaborate with partners under a commercial agency, distribution services, or license agreements.

It can commercialise straight away the French and English versions to interested partners, and is open to develop versions in other languages with its partners.

It offers the content in a package, including teacher training the first year the tool is adopted, and the fees are paid on annual basis.

Advantages & innovations

Experience in working every year with more than 2 500 pupils from primary schools to universities, who have their entrepreneurial spirit brought to life using the association's materials and tools. The solution can bring new pedagogy experience to teacher staff: o Collaborative pedagogy, encouraging teamwork and collaboration o Reflective learning, encouraging self-awareness, personal development and the ability to learn from experience o Critical thinking, encouraging the development of creative and critical faculties o Communication pedagogy, encouraging the development of Leadership skills and public speaking skills Inspiration from collaborations during the course of various research missions looking at entrepreneurial education techniques in Quebec, where teachers start using entrepreneurial activities in nursery school.

Stage of development

Already on the market

Partner sought

The French association is looking for partners internationally to explore opportunities of collaboration. They can be schools or municipalities interested in using the entrepreneurship digital tool in secondary schools. Partners can also be digital tool providers such as companies active in entrepreneurship or companies active in the training sector, that are used to working with and supplying secondary education schools. Partnerships could be under the scope of a commercial agency or licence agreement. Furthermore, it is interested in adapting the solution in other languages and in offering its expertise in entrepreneurial pedagogy. It is open to collaborations with partners who would like to develop training in this field in order to help teachers manage entrepreneurial projects in their classroom. It is therefore open to licence agreement with partners that can use the content of the platform on annual basis, adapting it in other languages, for example – it could be exclusive for a country with the possibility to grant sub-licences or non-exclusive licences.