INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION, AGBOR
UNIVERSITY OF DELTA
NAME: ADOH KATHERINE NWAKAEGO
MAT NO: FOE/AGR/20/21/274160
CODE: CSC311
DEPARTMENT: POLITICAL SCIENCE
LEVEL: 300
FACULTY: EDUCATION
QUESTION
Technological influence on the prospect of business and Entrepreneurship education
ABSTRACT
After the outbreak of COVID-19, the digital transformation of entrepreneurship
education has received considerable critical attention. In this context, this paper aims
to stand in the intersection of technology and education, and conduct a systematic
analysis regarding the impact of digital technologies on entrepreneurship education.
This paper first reviewed the recent developments of digital technologies and their
practical applications on academic entrepreneurship. Furthermore, to conduct a
structured literature overview, four hundred and five papers were selected and
extracted from the Scopus and Web of Science database and were analyzed from
multiple perspectives. Results indicated that although there is a growing trend in digital
entrepreneurship literature, future efforts are still required to explore their practical
applications according to the needs of times and society.
1. INTRODUCTION
Entrepreneurship education has long been regarded as one of the most potential
subjects because of its irreplaceable role in bridging the gap between theory and
sincere practices and its profound impact on cultivating future generations of
innovative talents. It not only refers to the process of helping people develop the
knowledge, skills, attitudes, and personal competencies to accomplish their goals, but
also relates to the industry connections and hands-on practices that are essential to
encourage entrepreneurship success in the future [1]. Its inherent nature of interactive
teaching and experience-based learning greatly differentiates itself from other
educational activities. And educational institutions have established extensive
cooperation with the industry, including renowned firms, startup companies, and
business incubators [2]. Therefore, it would of critical importance to design its own
style of teaching method and target efforts at innovative courses to maximize the
effectiveness of entrepreneurship education.
Meanwhile, the mind-blowing technological advancements and their disruptive effects
have brought about tremendous changes in virtually all aspects of our society.
Needless to say, the new wave of digital transformation empowered by smart plus
technologies, including the Internet of Things, augmented reality, and artificial
intelligence, has opened up fresh opportunities for innovators and enterprisers. The
disruptive force of digitalization is also fully utilized in the academic context to support
educational research and fulfill the universities’ third mission [3].
After the outbreak of COVID-19, the worldwide education and research communities
are looking for viable solutions that combine digital technologies and entrepreneurship
education, with the aim to counter off the detrimental impacts of social distancing.
They also place great hopes on a higher level of penetration of innovative technologies
to enhance the development of academic entrepreneurship, such as a broader
spectrum of teaching methods, the identification of possible venture opportunities and
emerging forms of entrepreneurship.
Although the academic circles have held a strong interest in this topic for nearly a
decade, the digital revolution of entrepreneurship education in the new era of
technology still remains an issue to be resolved. Meanwhile, the recent
developments of digital technologies and unexpected changes in the situation also
proposed new directions for future research regarding the far-reaching implications of
digital technologies on entrepreneurship education. Thus, this paper summarized the
latest development over the years and conducted a holistic review of available
literature to analyze the academic landscape on the topic investigated. In addition,
another purpose of this paper is to explore the current progress and any possible
research gaps, hoping to make positive contributions to future studies.
2. DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION
2.1. The Use of Online Technologies in the Per- COVID world
Digital technologies have been widely acknowledged as an incredible tool that supports
and reshapes the field of education in the last decade. On the one hand, it opens up a
new channel to access a diverse range of information through the internet without
actually traveling to learning centers. Multiple online learning platforms, which include
Khan Academy, Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), and online degree programs, to
name just a few, have increasingly become a blossoming market and a rich source of
fresh ideas [4]. On the other hand, digital technologies dramatically changed the ways
of communication and cooperation. Teachers are empowered to utilize online- based
methods to deliver lectures, assign homework, and email questions to class. At the
same time, students could work on group projects via Zoom Meetings, Chegg, and
Google docs regardless of their location. They can also share their thoughts and
experience with students from other universities who are following the same academic
path.
However, as technology may seem promising for future education, it is still not a
panacea for all kinds of courses, especially when it comes to entrepreneurship
education. It would be hard for online learning to completely replace physical contact
and hands-on practice, such as to implement entrepreneurship ideas and create
university-based innovation ecosystems. Therefore, during the pre-COIVD period, the
use of digital technologies in entrepreneurship education was limited and only
occupied a relatively small part of students’ learning activities.
1.1. Important Catalyst for Change: COVID- 19 Pandemic
In the early 2020s, the outbreak of COVID-19 has created the largest disturbance in the
social and economic activities so far in history. It started in Wuhan, Hubei, China, and
soon evolved to become a global health crisis due to its high infectiousness through
respiratory droplets or close personal contact with COVID-19 patients. In response to
this emergency, many countries were forced to put in place policies of social distancing
and home quarantine or isolation to slow the spread of this contagious disease [5].
Meanwhile, this coronavirus pandemic also posed a series of challenges in the field of
management education [6]. The city lockdowns and even school closures made it less
likely to continue traditional in- class teaching. Social activities, experiential courses,
and hands-on practices can be extremely difficult to take place under the restrictions
on large gatherings and public events. Furthermore, closed borders and reduced
international flights limited the possibility of international students coming from
abroad. To deal with this unprecedented situation, universities, colleges, and schools
have gone through a massive shift to online teaching and distant learning [7].
A variety of digital technologies and communication methods came into play to
redesign the existing teaching methodologies and implement new education processes.
As online education was slipping into the mainstream, MOOC platforms began to take
the lead in providing systematic academic courses and high-quality educational
resources to serve the pressing needs of teachers and students who have been
affected by the global pandemic. A majority of universities have upgraded their
infrastructure, launched online courses, and implemented remote education programs
to offer effective, timely, and customized learning experiences [8].
1.2. Digital Transformation of Entrepreneurship Education and Its Impact
As mentioned in the previous sections, since the huge trends towards international
entrepreneurship were interrupted by the outbreak of COVID-19, a national tide of
business and the entrepreneurial boom was greatly supercharged, which also marked
the dawning of a new era of entrepreneurship education. Meanwhile, the remarkable
size of online learning and the advance in technical competence offer novel models and
tools to carry out enterprising education.
The strategic importance of enterprising education and the smart use of cutting-edge
technology further speeded up the digital transformation process. Firstly, learning
analytics is introduced to measure the academic performance of students with the aim
to understand and optimize the overall learning process [2]. By looking at their critical
data and key metrics retrieved from time on task, progress curve, research output, etc.,
researchers and learning managers could fully grasp the learning process and make
constant adjustments to maintain a suitable path of entrepreneurial learning. Students
can also take advantage of web-based self-diagnostic tools
to evaluate their strengths and weaknesses and identify their areas of interest.
Secondly, the augmented reality and artificial intelligence could supplement the
existing online teaching methods by filling the gap in real-life immersion. They are
expected to replicate diverse campus activities and some certain practical experience
in the digital environment. In several STEM subjects such as engineering, some schools
prepared a set of tools based on augmented reality to conduct experiments and
simulate results, help students develop inspiring attitudes towards entrepreneurship
[9]. Lastly, the blended online and offline courses would also serve as a bridge to close
the chasm between theory and
applications. Online educators are encouraged to use integrative communications,
including live feedback, student polls, and break-out discussions. It would be equally
important to give students a greater amount of freedom by choosing their own style of
learning. Furthermore, taking advantage of the geographic flexibility, entrepreneurship
education would require to enhance community engagement and social participation.
This hybrid learning model and “crowd- sourced” activities can continue to promote
the process of digital transformation.
A summary of the major developments and their educational impact is presented
below:
Table 1. Major developments pre and post COVID-19 and their educational impact
Time Pre COVID-19 During COVID-19 Post COVID-19
Teaching method Classroom/Face-to-face Onlineeducation/e- Virtual education and
teaching learning courses face-to- face
instructions
Technology/ MOOCs, Khan Learning management Augmented reality,
Platforms/ Tools Academy, Coursera, systems, mobile artificial intelligence,
Udemy, etc learning, big data analytics,
communication virtual laboratories
technologies
Impact on Open access to rich Emergency fill during Digital transformation;
resources; Flexibility to the crisis; Expand usage Bridge the gap
entrepreneurship
take courses anywhere scenarios to support between theory and
education
and anytime regular learning practice
1. LITERATURE ANALYSIS AND FUTURE TRENDS
This section analyzed the impact of digital technologies on entrepreneurship education
from the perspective of literature review and analysis. Although the online learning
framework on innovation and entrepreneurship is a critical aspect of the higher
education system, its academic research is rather scattered and immethodical to
support meaningful implications and future guidance. Therefore, this study aims to
provide a systematic review and descriptive analysis in this field of research and shed
light on trends and gaps.
To conduct the literature review, this paper conducted bibliometric analysis through
text search and database querying in Web of Science and Scopus from Elsevier, two of
the largest abstract databases in the academic community. All the retrieved and
reviewed literature is English publications related to
entrepreneurship education. To determine the precise scope of our work, this paper
identified several search strings and relevant keywords (entrepreneurship education in
combination with digital technologies), which are presented in the table below.
Table 2. Search strings and keywords
Category Search queries
Entrepreneur “entrepreneurship education” OR “academic
ship entrepreneurship” OR
education
“innovation education” OR “entrepreneurship
university*”
Digital “digital technolog*” OR “high technolog*” OR
technologies “digital transformation” OR “digitalization*” OR
“augmented reality” OR “artificial intelligence”
OR “big data*
OR “internet of things” OR “digital”
The results showed that there are 405 documents in total, including published book
chapters, journal papers, conference reviews, etc. In order to navigate a clear trend of
current progress, this study carried out a descriptive statistics analysis of publication
date, focused areas, geographic distribution, and citation analysis.
As can be seen from Figure 1, it is a clear trend that the number of publications is
increasing year by year, which indicated a growing interest among scholars and
researchers in investigating the intersection of entrepreneurship education and digital
technologies. Although the first paper was published in the year 1989, the annual
increase didn’t begin to surge until 2015. This implies that the digital impact on
entrepreneurship has received popular concern in recent years. The year 2019 and
2020 witnessed academic achievements flourishing as a result of the COVID-19 crisis.
The research topics have also been extended from purely theoretical questions to real-
life applications and best practices.
Figure 1 Number of Publications By Year
Apart from the number of annual publications, this paper also delved into the citation
overview. Compared with Figure 1, Figure 2 showed that there is a similar trend in the
number of citations due to the growth of scientific productivity. The rising number of
cited works means that they are well recognized in both scientific and educational
communities, and researchers are exploring the use of digital technologies in
entrepreneurship education with keen interest.
Figure 2 Citation Overview
Meanwhile, by looking at the subject area, the study observed that this topic has
garnered popular attention in the field of Social Science, Computer Science, Arts and
Humanities, Education, and Engineering. Therefore, entrepreneurship education and its
adoption of digital technologies is a multidisciplinary subject and expected to propel
the development in areas besides teaching and learning.
Figure 3 Publications By Subject Areas
Lastly, this study attempts to look at the geographic distribution of available
publications. Figure 4 listed eleven countries with the highest number of papers. A
majority of these papers were published in the United States and several European
countries. Though only 41 articles were published in China, most of them focused on
foreland research fields and progressed with new technical commitments that have
been put into use, such as network-based innovation, entrepreneurship training
system design, and entrepreneurship education in digital media. Besides, a bunch of
countries at the bottom of the list only published one paper, but this demonstrates
that the digital issues of entrepreneurship education are widely analyzed around the
world.
Figure 4 Number of Publications By Country
1. CONCLUSIONS
Under the dual function of technological innovation and macroscopic social change,
universities are now undertaking a critical role in building and affecting entrepreneurial
ecosystems. The impact of digital technologies on entrepreneurship education is
definitely the most dominant factor in this process. Based on our structured literature
review, this study has found that the quantity and quality of papers published on the
relationship between digital technologies and entrepreneurship education exhibited a
general trend of steady rise. Taken together with findings on the annual number of
publications, citations, subject areas, and geographic distributions, it seems that this
research.
Community is quite dispersed all over the world, but the topic was broadly examined
with condensed results. Therefore, it is promising to see this field flourishing in the
coming years. Meanwhile, current work and results are still limited to theoretical and
empirical contributions, and the existing practices in the past few years have not had
enough time to show effects. Their practical value shall be observed over a longer
period of time.
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