Knowledge Sharing & Learning
Facilitating knowledge sharing, shared learning, and information dissemination across the ecosystem.
Collaborative on Inclusive Entrepreneurship Education and Training
A systems and intersectional approach to inclusive entrepreneurship education and training (IEET) for women and youth.
CIEET
The Collaborative on Inclusive Entrepreneurship Education and Training
The WEIForward Collaborative on Inclusive Entrepreneurship Education and Training (WEIForward-CIEET), originally launched as a community of practice, has been re-branded and re-focused on the development of a systems and intersectional approach to inclusive entrepreneurship education and training (IEET) for women and youth.
What is the Collaborative for Inclusive Entrepreneurship Education & Training?
The CIEET brings together academics and practitioners engaged in designing and delivering EET. Our collective goal is to increase the inclusivity of the concepts, content, and delivery of EET to benefit learning and practice in order to increase the benefits of entrepreneurial activity for economic growth and sustainability.
Why Inclusive EET Matters
One of the principal pillars of WEIForward’s strategy is to support the development of deeper pipelines of transformational women-owned and youth-owned enterprises in the ‘missing middle’.
Structural Barriers & the Role of IEET
Women and youth who pursue entrepreneurial opportunities encounter structural and systemic biases that limit the development, scaling, and survival of their business ventures. They are generally constrained to smaller, less profitable, and slower-growing businesses than comparable ventures owned by men. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated these challenges for female-led businesses.
Education is an essential driver for economic empowerment. Inclusive entrepreneurship education and training (IEET) offers an important lever for scaling the development and delivery of business competency skills, experiential learning opportunities, and networks for women’s entrepreneurship. WEIForward advocates for IEET targeting women and youth at the secondary and tertiary levels of education to help #BreakTheBias.
Overarching Goal of WEIForward-CIEET
We apply a systems and intersectional approach to achieve the following:
Strengthen Design & Delivery
Strengthening the design and delivery of IEET courses and programs for greater impact.
Reduce Bias & Stereotypes
Reducing gender, ethnic, and occupational stereotypes and systemic biases that inhibit women’s entrepreneurship.
Build Coalitions
Building coalitions of policymakers, academics, practitioners, funders, and women and youth enterprise organizations to design and advocate for innovative solutions to addressing bias in EET.
From Barriers to Impact: How IEET Works
Structural & systemic barriers
Bias, norms, access to capital, networks
IEET as a lever
Inclusive concepts, content & delivery
Structural & systemic barriers
Bias, norms, access to capital, networks
GEET+ Pilot: Key Findings & Takeaways
Insights from the Gender-smart Entrepreneurship Education & Training Plus (GEET+) pilot
Awareness & interest
The GEET+ Scorecard raised awareness and stimulated respondents’ interest in learning about inclusive EET. There is scope to adapt and integrate assessment tools such as the GEET+.
Tool design challenges
The tool presented challenges related to design, criteria, targeting, and performance metrics that need to be addressed in future iterations.
Complex ecosystems
Entrepreneurial ecosystems are complex, encompassing social, economic, and cultural factors that constitute enablers, inhibitors, and actors specific to each country’s institutional framework and context.
Context-specific strategies
Strategies to address drivers and inhibitors of inclusive EET must be adapted to a range of context-specific factors: norms, institutions, structural and systemic barriers, and multi-level organizational frameworks.
Defining inclusive EET
Many organizations within the ecosystem face challenges in defining and operationalizing inclusive EET. There is a need to improve the design, content, and delivery of EET programs to benefit diverse constituents.
Incentivize change
Mobilize support for inclusive EET, manage risks and rewards, and incentivize change across the ecosystem.
Publications and Resources
Access our latest research, reports, and tools that drive evidence-based policy and practice
GEET Pilot Study Synthesis Report
The pilot study examines the adaptability and applicability of the Gender-smart Entrepreneurship Education and Training Plus (GEET+)1 scorecard.
Kenya GEET+ Pilot Study Report
The GEET+ Action Strategy is motivated by several observations. First, women entrepreneurs make significant contributions to economic growth
Mexico GEET+ Pilot Study Report
In an environment as diverse as Mexico, and where entrepreneurs and the private sector have been heavily impacted by the economic contraction
Nigeria GEET+ Pilot Study Report
The main objective of the GEET+ is to investigate the extent to which Nigeria’s system of entrepreneurship education and training is women-friendly.
Lagos Business School GEET Report
Nigeria is the most populous African nation with a population of more than 215.1 million people.
Peru GEET+ Pilot Study Report
The GEET+ scorecard is an assessment tool that translates academic research and evidence-based insights into practical applications
GEET+ Summary of findings and Recommendations
Entrepreneurship education is associated with business start-ups, enhancing entrepreneurial competencies, increasing confidence or self-efficacy, and informing opportunity identification.