Explanations.

What is the "Esprit d'entreprendre" plan?

Do you know many great innovative companies created by students? There are plenty of them, but few are really showcased.

Entrepreneurship means creating an innovative start-up or running an association project, for example. The government's aim is to keep pace with changes in the world of work, the acceleration of careers and professional mobility, and the emergence of new professions under the pressure of the digital revolution.

The aim is to increase the number of entrepreneurial training courses, enhance the value of project management, improve recognition of the knowledge developed by student entrepreneurs, andopen up entrepreneurship to all students. It must bring together universities, schools, teachers, researchers, students, local authorities, businesses and investors to create a new ecosystem favorable to entrepreneurship.

More than 120,000 students were made aware of entrepreneurship in 2018, and nearly 9,000 benefited from "student entrepreneur" status!

What are the proposed measures?

The plan presented by Frédérique Vidal, Minister of Higher Education, Research and Innovation, contains 8 key measures:

  • Make all students aware of the entrepreneurial spirit , and cultivate an entrepreneurial spirit through presentations by professionals in junior high, high school and university.
  • A tailor-made entrepreneurship training offer, adapted to each student with the development of semesters entirely dedicated to the development of a start-up project, or the taking of courses directly oriented in this direction. For students, this status makes it easier to juggle their studies and their project, with flexible timetables.
  • Give real recognition to the D2E student entrepreneur diploma, and work more closely with socio-economic partners.
  • Open up access to national student-entrepreneur status by increasing PEPITE resources, defining a limited number of national criteria for awarding student-entrepreneur status, and formalizing the rights and duties associated with each. The government would also like to grant a bonus to compensate for the internship allowance, and make it easier for scholarship-holders to work as part-time students.
  • Make PEPITE hubs "totem places" on campuses, providing them with friendly, well-equipped locations, extending co-working spaces and facilitating the national mobility of student entrepreneurs.
  • Scale up PEPITE management by increasing the budget allocated to them, creating a top-level training program for mission managers, structuring a network of referral teachers within each university, and opening up PEPITE centers to accomplished entrepreneurs.
  • Promote French student entrepreneurship internationally by facilitating the mobility of student entrepreneurs, accelerating the sharing of experience with other countries and creating international mobility grants.
  • Appoint a ministerial delegate for student entrepreneurship to mobilize the entire ecosystem. BPI France will become a key player in the project, and their financial products will be easier to access for student entrepreneurs.

More than 200 companies were created by PEPITE laureates between 2014 and 2017!

Who can benefit?

The plan is aimed at all students and entrepreneurs, and particularly at young people in secondary or higher education. More broadly, one of the measures proposes to integrate more experienced people, to create a stimulating ecosystem and encourage emulation.

In this way, you'll be able to take full advantage of the Esprit d'entreprendre program, whatever your level of training or project.

However, the actions developed focus mainly on students.

The government's ambition is to create a generation of students with the entrepreneurial spirit to adapt French society and its training and job opportunities to the digital and social changes of the 21st century. More and more young people want to set up their own business, to be freer, more independent and more mobile.

Student interest in the status of student entrepreneur is growing steadily, as evidenced by the ever-increasing number of applications, a sign of the dynamism that entrepreneurship will bring to France in the coming years!