Arts and Humanities Entrepreneurship Hub

Our Thriving Tribe

Our Thriving Tribe (OTT) curatorial project began in 2019 at Visual, Carlow in Ireland as part of the Arts and Humanities Entrepreneurship Hub AHEH Project. The AHEH project brings together 14 partners from across 7 EU member states to improve the entrepreneurial capacity of A&H students with an innovative programme of entrepreneurial training.

As a curatorial project Our Thriving Tribe (OTT) aims to expand upon the current discourse on entrepreneurship within the arts in Ireland. A process of enquiry into the context of artistic practice by researching entrepreneurship from the perspective of the artist in order to generate new knowledge within this field.

The Our Thriving Tribe webpage provides all the latest updates on this project, including the OTT Zoom Room Sessions, Gesture & Perspective.

AHEH is a major European 3-year project that brings together an alliance of 14 partners from 7 European countries.

Partners from academia and industry will work together to jointly research, design, test and disseminate a programme of entrepreneurial training for Arts and Humanities staff and students.

AHEH project aims

To develop a tailored Arts and Humanities entrepreneurship model that improves the long-term entrepreneurial prospects for A&H students.

To create 7 new A&H Entrepreneurship Hubs situated in partner faculties. These will be the specialist conduits for permanently improving the entrepreneurial skill-sets of A&H staff and students as well as a template for wider exploitation.

To have Higher Education Institutions, creative industries, businesses and stakeholders working together to champion the value of A&H students to a wider audience and ensure that industry need is reflected in the training programmes.

For students a focus has been placed to develop new, innovative and multidisciplinary approaches to teaching and learning by building a mix of training methodologies based on entrepreneurship education, mentoring and application of research outcomes to support innovation in businesses.

For Universities Staff a focus has been placed to stimulate entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial skills of higher education teaching staff by creating ‘Entrepreneurship Hubs’ in partner faculties. This will include training university staff on how to support students in developing their entrepreneurial attributes, strengthening their business ideas and becoming more employable.

For Businesses a focus has been placed to facilitate the exchange, flow and co-creation of knowledge by promoting cross-fertilisation in the knowledge alliance based on connecting [introducing] arts and humanities students with [to] a range of inter-disciplinary businesses in order to improve enterprise skills, encourage entrepreneurship and foster innovation within partner businesses.

The AHEH alliance will:

Bring together 14 partners from across 7 EU member states to improve the entrepreneurial capacity of A&H students.
Jointly research, design, test and disseminate an innovative programme of entrepreneurial training for A&H staff/ students aligned with the EntreComp Competence Framework. This builds upon partners’ prior experience of EU-funded enterprise projects.
Have HEIs, businesses and stakeholders working together to champion the value of A&H students to a wider audience and ensure that industry need is reflected in the training programmes.
Create 7 new A&H Entrepreneurship Hubs situated in partner faculties. These will be the specialist conduits for permanently improving the entrepreneurial skill-sets of A&H staff and students as well as a template for wider exploitation.
Create a website that will complement the 7 Hubs as an ongoing resource-base for disseminating/exploiting outputs. These include:
3 training programmes: HEI, A&H Students, Businesses
3 manuals: Trainers, Users, AHEH Management
2 contextual reports: Academic & Business

European Arts and Humanities students face challenges with accessing graduate level employment and entrepreneurship opportunities. These courses typically do not have a direct route to the job market, reflected in higher unemployment and lower salaries. There can be a lack of knowledge from academics about aligning subject expertise with wider industry need as well as a lack of recognition by businesses of the wider benefits and skill sets of Arts and Humanities graduates.

Dedicated support in HEIs for entrepreneurial activity has been mainly focused on business, economics and ICT faculties. A&H Students come from a very different starting point, with education and skills that do not meet industry need in an obvious way.

Therefore, a fresh approach is needed to develop a tailored A&H entrepreneurship model that improves the long-term entrepreneurial prospects for A&H students.The partnership will offer further opportunities to develop student exchange programmes and to explore shared research interests and opportunities for international collaboration.

The project AHEH is co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union.
For further information on the Arts & Humanities Entrepreneurship Hub see AHEH Website
For further information on Our Thriving Tribe & AHEH see THRIVE Visual
Case studies, news from the AHEH network or mentors stories are available through the AHEH website
A copy of a AHEH research report is available on the AHEH website
When Arts and Enterprise Collide Link
When Arts and Enterprise Collide – Creating an Artists Residency

Contacts at Visual

AHEH Project Co-Ordinator
david@visualcarlow.ie

AHEH Project Manager
jharvey@visualcarlow.ie

AHEH Coordinator
University of Wales Trinity Saint David (United Kingdom)

Type: Knowledge Alliance, Key Action 2
Ref: 588387-EPP-1-2017-1-UK-EPPKA2-KA
Start Date: 01/01/2018
End Date: 31/ 12/2021