GERMÁN Urreta has spent his whole life risking. At 87, he has always had an entrepreneurial attitude in response to the needs of the time, he has never waited, he has tried with all the opportunities he has seen. Although needs have changed a great deal over those years, the goal is the same for many young people today: not waiting and acting courageously. There is a significant change between two eras: today children are working on entrepreneurship in schools. The different generations have made us realize that it is a matter of character and that you learn to be brave and to try to achieve the goals.

 

Thus, in the Ikastola Aita Larramendi of Andoain, for example, entrepreneurship works through different programs. “We always seek to motivate and engage students, instead of telling students what they have to do, contextualize them. In this context, for them to take steps, to decide”, said Professor Gorka Matute. June Miner, 11, has stated that she learns doing activities outside of class with her classmates: “Let’s study the river’s water, see how trees are planted and then grown, and we also participate in the second-hand market, where we sell things we don’t need.” He's been doing it since he was six years old, and he's used to it. Young children are asked to do little things. When you're making drawings or singing, that is, working creativity, you're working on entrepreneurship. They do it by driving, but openly. They're called "Let's draw a landscape." “We don’t tell them what they have to do. We don’t tell them that they have to make sun and grass, so everyone draws their image and goes ahead,” Matute said.

 

In addition, ikastola encourages the opinion of boys and girls to be important in the municipality. Two boys and girls, on behalf of the rest, meet with representatives of the City Hall every year and commit to what happened during the year. They also propose changes to improve the people. In short, the fact that the City meets with them highlights the proposals made.

In the same ikastola Alejandro Ugalde also studied. Natural from Zarautz, is 16 years old. Last year he was in Paris with his classmates, and it was not just a trip, before he had already worked on events in France at the ikastola and then developed it firsthand. “It’s different to see it there or read it in the book. Seeing that you learn more, they are more intense memories.” He stressed that the projects being worked on at the Ikastola help him to undertake: “The Kosmodisea competition helps you move. Don’t wait, you’re looking for things.” In the Kosmodisea competition, which aims to promote entrepreneurship, young people have to think about a project and carry it out. “Last year we made a video and for that we interviewed people. Many times we think we are not able to do it, but if we are, everything is a matter of attitude and resources, of course.”

 

They attach great importance to mutual assistance in the centre. “We’ve been pushing since we were young that they have to help each other, that they have to take initiative and that they are able to carry out those projects that they think, that there are no obstacles. It’s in their hands.” MATUTE stressed that these types of programmes generate ideas: “Motivation increases with these types of projects and participation is also better. In ordinary classroom activities, it costs them more, makes them more boring. This type of project fosters imagination and intervention.” In addition, ikastola uses these types of activities to promote awareness of nature care. They address ecosystem issues such as waste management.

 

Entrepreneurship is something that can be transmitted at home and that is why the learning community seeks parental involvement. If the father and the mother do, it will be easier for the children to do so as well.

In Vocational Training and in the University there are as many options as you want to work on entrepreneurship. Ten years ago, in Vocational Training, entrepreneurship began to be promoted with two clear objectives: that students assume an entrepreneurial attitude and that they create companies. In order to achieve the first objective, they launched the Ikasenpresa programme, which consists of setting up a small business during school hours. Students have to get in touch with each other, distribute tasks, market and market the product created. “They work on what needs to be done to start a company and develop entrepreneurial skills,” explained the Basque Government’s Director of Vocational Training, Ramón Martínez de Murgia. Over 6,000 students have participated in recent years. “The habits of undertaking are not very internalized and we do so for it,” he added.

 

From there, people who wish to do so can set up a real company through the Urrats bat project. Thanks to this project, a number of companies have been set up, usually small, and many companies have been set up. In their beginnings they have the help of the faculty and in the first year the center gives them a space for them to have a residence. “The program is yielding very good results and the students are satisfied. So far they have created 376 companies, of which 76% have remained,” explained Martínez de Murgia. 70% of companies are service companies and the remaining 30% are industrial companies.

 

A total of 59 companies were launched in 2013. “The economic situation is bad and the number of companies created is very good. It is our intention to continue with this and to create more if possible. Young people leave school with a project going on and don't have to depend on anyone. As the economic situation stands, it is a good solution. I would also like to highlight the commitment of young people to society, who make a contribution to society and that is very positive for them and for all.”

 

The university also offers the possibility to work on entrepreneurship. Markel Gilbert, 23, is a cooperative she has created with her colleagues and has just acquired an official character. And brother no? company is an initiative that has emerged among nine students. Gilbert's studies have also been completely entrepreneurship oriented, it was clear that he preferred something other than usual studies, so when he read in an article that in Mondragon Unibertsitatea would launch studies based on Finland's methodology, he didn't think twice. “They said that ordinary studies would work on things that were not worked, that was very practical,” and he pointed out.

 

“From day one you create a company with a group and you manage it. If you meet the goals set by the company, you go beyond the studies. It's an absolutely practical learning, a chaos." To enter, they do not ask for half-notes, cast and “look for people with another attitude, make groups based on a test, and through that group we create a company. It’s true that at first it surprises you, we’re not used to it,” says Gilbert.

 

She completed her studies in July. “Our intention has always been to continue with our company.” The company was established at the University of Deusto and, after these four years, the achievement of official cooperative status has been a natural step. “We’ve done very different things, but we wanted to create something that’s ours.” He underlined that they have done a great deal of strategically: in short, they have concretized what they wanted to do. The aim of the nine is to work in education, to publicise the Finnish methodology and, in addition, to work with companies in the innovation processes of companies. “At the end of the day the market tells you everything, he guides you. Therefore, later on we will see whether or not we comply with what we have now set ourselves.”

 

What have you learned from all of this? “You want to take initiative and risk.” She still has many issues to deal with in other studies, “but I have the courage to decide and I can set goals and keep learning. More than the content, studies have given me an attitude, and that is more useful,” Gilbert said.

Nagore Urreta has also just turned 23, just finished her master’s degree in entrepreneurship, but it’s not a passion that only comes from what she’s studied in college: “I studied in Madrid, and every time they explained to me what I was an entrepreneur, my father and my grandfather came to my head. Until then I had not realized it, because I've grown up with it, but if I think it's amazing what they've done, they haven't been afraid of anything and that seems to me the most important thing." From now on, Urreta is wondering what to do. She lives and wants to take advantage of it for the future in a hamlet, she doesn't have a project defined for the time being, but she has the idea of creating a space for the disabled, and the initiative also has to do with animals.

 

Nagore's father is Esteban. He takes a lifetime from one side to the other and says that he has also learned that way of acting at home. “When we were on vacation at the age of 7, friends used to play and I worked with my father, since I was little I had the illusion of learning and facing the challenges.” Now she would like her daughter to launch the idea she has worked on the Master’s End Project. The father and daughter want to create a self-repair space for boats, as is done in the car sector. They believe there are possibilities, and in meals and dinners among relatives they see it clearer that it is feasible to talk about the project. In addition, Esteban has already patented a product, has improved others and thinks about more.

 

After all, the temperament of Nagore and Esteban has been influenced by Germán and José Luis Rodríguez López. I was born with a disability, with my feet inward. The operation allowed him to walk again, which gave him strength to deal with anything, even bravely. He has created an orchestra, he has had a button factory, he has invented the products, he has made the machines he needed, he has seen and improved the ones that were already made, he has asked people and done tests, he has had the ability to adapt the projects of others to his goals… He has never been standing. It relates this inactivity to the hunger of yesteryear, to passion, to the desire to carry out the project it desires. “When I was young, about 13 years old, we went to the railroad to break lanes with the dynamite, and then take the pieces, sell them and take the money home.”

 

They also saw an opportunity when buying the farmhouse and decided to build a rural house. “It was an amazing experience,” they all stressed. From a young age, the children of the house have also helped, and Nagore would like to follow the path of his father and grandfather through that habit. Adults look at the youngest with admiration, because they don't fear making mistakes in the future and on the way, because they look to the future with determination.