Aalto University: Aalto-led project on student entrepreneurship comes to a successful close

Entrepreneurial skills — such as creativity, collaboration and self-development — are important skills for all students, not just entrepreneurs. The YYTO-project searched for ways to support, recognize and acknowledge these skills.

Increasing students’ entrepreneurial skills can increase the number of startups founded, but above all it helps them to challenge existing ways of working and to bring about the necessary change in existing organizations.

However, a lot of entrepreneurial skills and ways of thinking are learnt outside the classroom.

The YYTO-project, led by Aalto University and funded by the Ministry of education and culture, has been researching ways to support students in learning these skills outside their studies, and for teachers to recognize and acknowledge them. The project has now come to an end after running from 2018 to 2021.

One of the biggest solutions developed during the project is the Yoop-tool, which students can use to better understand their own entrepreneurial competence, and teachers can use to more easily grant credits based on that competence. There has also been several academic papers and one book written during the project, trainings for teachers have been arranged and entrepreneurial activities in several higher educational institutes have been improved upon. The student associations involved and Startuplifers have been able to develop their activities and increase their reach.

During the project, Aalto University collaborated with many educational institutes all over the country, participated in creating the Yoop-tool and traded valuable tips for supporting student entrepreneurship with other organizations.