Beyond start-up: enterprise and entrepreneurship education for entrepreneurial careers, places and ecosystems.

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Introduction

This Special Issue draws on a selected set of papers presented at the 2026 ISBE and EEUK conferences that most strongly align with the intellectual contribution of the issue. Invitations have been issued to authors whose work demonstrates the potential to advance theoretical and empirical understanding of enterprise and entrepreneurship education beyond start-up outcomes

Enterprise and entrepreneurship education research has historically been evaluated through venture creation and start-up intention outcomes. However, most learners pursue entrepreneurial careers through employment, intrapreneurship, portfolio work and participation in innovation ecosystems rather than founding firms.

This Special Issue advances enterprise and entrepreneurship education beyond start-up by examining how educational practices develop capabilities that enable individuals to navigate careers and contribute to places, organisations and opportunity structures. The aim is not simply to document activity but to explain outcomes: how learning designs produce agency, networks, identity, judgement and value-creating behaviour, and under what conditions they succeed or fail.

We particularly encourage work that identifies mechanisms linking educational experience to credible outcomes and recognises that these outcomes are shaped by context — including institutions, labour markets, ecosystems and access to networks. Contributions should therefore move beyond descriptive accounts of programmes and instead provide theoretically informed evidence explaining what works, for whom, and why.

As this is a curated special issue, submissions are limited to invited authors. However, acceptance is not guaranteed and all manuscripts must meet the scholarly contribution required for publication in Education + Training. 

List of Topic Areas

• Enterprise and entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial careers (employment, intrapreneurship, portfolio pathways)
• Mechanisms of capability development (identity, agency, networks, judgement, opportunity recognition)
• Educational design and long-term outcomes
• Ecosystems, place and opportunity structures as boundary conditions
• Access, inequality and participation in entrepreneurial networks
• Work-integrated enterprise and entrepreneurship learning and education work transitions
• Evaluation methods beyond start-up metrics (longitudinal, realist, mixed-method approaches)
• Institutional and policy contexts shaping educational effectiveness
• Enterprise and entrepreneurship education and societal challenges (sustainability, technological transition, regional resilience)

Submissions Information

Submissions are made using ScholarOne Manuscripts. Registration and access are available here: https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/et 
Author guidelines must be strictly followed. Please see here: https://www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/journal/et 
Authors should select (from the drop-down menu) the special issue title at the appropriate step in the submission process, i.e. in response to ““Please select the issue you are submitting to”. 
Submitted articles must not have been previously published, nor should they be under consideration for publication anywhere else, while under review for this journal.

Key Deadlines

Open submission window: 9th November 2026
Close submission window: 1st March 2027