Emeghara Angel & Umoroduah Atonte Kehinde
Enhancing Entrepreneurial Mind-Set and Innovation Capabilities through Mentorship Programs among Business Education Students in Universities in Rivers State
Abstract
This study investigated how entrepreneurial mind-set and innovation capabilities can be enhanced through mentorship programs among business education students in universities in Rivers State. Three objectives, three research questions, and three hypotheses were formulated and guided the study. The study adopted a survey research design with a population of 815 final-year students of universities in Rivers State. The sample size of 265 respondents comprising of 124 males and 141 females was derived using Krejcie and Morgan table and simple random sampling technique was used to arrive at the final distribution of the sample size used for the study. A structured questionnaire titled; “Entrepreneurial Mind-set and Innovation Capabilities through Mentorship Programs Questionnaire” was used as the instrument for data collection. The instrument was validated by three experts, two from business education department and one from measurement and evaluation department. The instrument was subjected to a pilot study to ascertain its reliability, which yielded a reliability index of 0.80 through the Cronbach Alpha test. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions while the independent t-test was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study showed among others, that there is a significant difference in the level of mentorship programs among male and female business education students in universities in Rivers State and there is no significant difference in how mentorship programs enhance the entrepreneurial mind-set of male and female business education students in universities in Rivers State. The study concluded that mentorship programs have the potential to equally benefit both male and female business education students in developing their entrepreneurial mind-set and innovation capabilities. The study recommended, among others, that universities in Rivers State should prioritize the improvement of mentorship programs for business education students, particularly focusing on bridging the gap between male and female students and Universities in Rivers State should continue to prioritize a wide range of mentorship programs to enhance the entrepreneurial mind-set of business education students regardless of gender.
Keywords: Entrepreneurial Mindset, Innovation, Capabilities, Mentorship, Business Education.
