Integrating Agricultural Entrepreneurship into High School Agriculture Curriculum

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify and describe high school agriculture teachers’ perceptions regarding entrepreneurship and determine their entrepreneurial leanings toward and interest in integrating entrepreneurship concepts into their curricula. Respondents perceived that entrepreneurship is a learned skill, creativity and innovation can be nurtured, and almost everyone has potential to research and create a business. A majority of the respondents perceived that entrepreneurs can have global influence, can create wealth and jobs, and are driven by desires to create their own destinies. Regarding their own inclinations to start enterprises, a majority of the respondents indicated that they occasionally or frequently considered starting their own enterprises. About ten percent of the respondents indicated that they always saw business opportunities and desired to establish and become bosses of their own businesses. Forty–three percent of the respondents frequently or always integrated entrepreneurial concepts into their courses and nearly sixty percent of the respondents nurtured students’ business ideas. However, just about thirty percent of the teachers frequently or always engaged students in specific product creation, marketing, sales, and evaluation. Nearly all (98.7 percent) of the respondents agreed that agriculture teachers should integrate entrepreneurial concepts into their curriculum.