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Identifying and teaching high-growth entrepreneurship: Experimental evidence from entrepreneurship academies for university students in Uganda

Last registered on August 29, 2019

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Identifying and teaching high-growth entrepreneurship: Experimental evidence from entrepreneurship academies for university students in Uganda
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0004502
Initial registration date
August 26, 2019

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
August 29, 2019, 8:42 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Region

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
University of Groningen

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation
LMU Munich
PI Affiliation
Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition
PI Affiliation
LMU Munich
PI Affiliation
LMU Munich

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2019-08-28
End date
2021-12-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
Businesses in low-income countries tend to be small and typically have little prospects for growth. Our study centers around an entrepreneurship training for university students implemented by StartHub Africa that sets out to foster the creation of high-potential enterprises. We will study selection into participation in the entrepreneurship training, in particular the role of preferences, beliefs, personality traits, and cognitive ability, and the short- and medium-term impacts of the entrepreneurship training on business creation, performance, and jobs creation, as well as labor market outcomes. Our identification strategy relies on randomized marketing message and data collection from representative populations of potential applicants to address selection question, and an oversubscription design and a random assignment of applicants to participate in the entrepreneurship training for the main evaluation of the entrepreneurship training.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Bartos, Vojtech et al. 2019. "Identifying and teaching high-growth entrepreneurship: Experimental evidence from entrepreneurship academies for university students in Uganda." AEA RCT Registry. August 29. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.4502-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We study a novel entrepreneurship training program offered by StartHub Africa (SHA) that teaches business skills and an entrepreneurial mindset to university students in Uganda. The extra-curricular program is aligned with the semester and consists of 3-hour weekly sessions over 9 weeks at several leading Ugandan universities. In the academy, individuals individually or in teams develop a business plan and a business prototype. SHA runs the academies twice per year (spring and fall).
Intervention (Hidden)
We study a novel entrepreneurship training program offered by StartHub Africa (SHA) that teaches business skills and an entrepreneurial mindset to university students in Uganda. The extra-curricular program is aligned with the semester and consists of 3-hour weekly sessions over 9 weeks at several leading Ugandan universities. In the academy, individuals individually or in teams develop a business plan and a business prototype. SHA runs the academies twice per year (spring and fall).
To study selection, we randomly advertise two marketing messages in information sessions during the recruiting phase: financial gains and independence & creative freedom. These messages are included in promotion videos that are shown during info sessions on two info days per university per academy. Each info session will last around 30 minutes, there will be info sessions from 10.00 – 17.00 per day, so in total around 10 info sessions per day. We also compare how those who self-select into entrepreneurship training differ from a randomly selected sample drawn from the population of university students attending largest classes who were not interested in participating, while being aware of the offer of free entrepreneurship training.
Intervention Start Date
2019-09-15
Intervention End Date
2020-07-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
• Business creation
• Business performance
• Business experience
• Business inputs (capital & labor)
• Employment status
• Job search (duration, intensity)
• Employment experience
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
Details in pre-analysis plan, including how families of variables are generated.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
• Products & Innovation
• Business networks
• Access to finance
• Business practices
• Overconfidence
• Dealing with failure
• Grit
• Big 5
• Personal initiative
• Risk preferences
• Loss aversion
• Time preferences
• Entrepreneurial future
• Cognitive ability
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
Details in pre-analysis plan, including how families of variables are generated.

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
Our evaluation of the entrepreneurship academy relies on an oversubscription design. Of all applicants we randomly select who will participate (treatment group) and who will not (control group).

We also study selection into the entrepreneurship academy by randomly exposing interested students to different marketing message on the information day. We collect data at different stages of the selection process: when showing interest in the training, when applying to the training, and when participating in the training. We also collect data from a sample of university students participating in large classes in which the training was advertised and who did not show interest in participating in the training. How do they differ from those who have shown interest?
Experimental Design Details
We study a novel entrepreneurship training, an entrepreneurship academy, offered to students for free by StartHub Africa (SHA). The academy teaches business skills and an entrepreneurial mindset to university students in Uganda. The extra-curricular program is aligned with the semester and consists of 3-hour weekly sessions over 9 weeks at several leading Ugandan universities. In the academy, individuals or teams develop a business plan and a business prototype. SHA runs the academies twice per year (spring and fall).

We advertise the training in large classes at the participating universities. We collect data on where the academy was advertised. The advertisement campaign describes the academy briefly. Those interested in more details and potentially in applying are invited to an information session. The 30 minutes long information sessions take place at each university over two days. There are about 10 sessions on each day. Across different sessions, we randomly manipulate the central message promoting the academy in customized video messages. The videos either highlight the profit motives for becoming an entrepreneur, or they highlight entrepreneurial independence and creative freedom. Participation in an information session is a pre-requisite for applying to the academy. The application forms are distributed at the info sessions.

Based on past experience, we expect that there would be an excess interest in applying for the academy. Since predicting who would benefit from the training the most is difficult (e.g., McKenzie and Sansone 2019 and discussions with SHA), we fully randomize selection from the entire pool of applicants. This allows us to construct a treatment group that receives the training and a control group that is excluded from the academy. We also randomly select a third, “buffer” group from which we draw additional academy participants should some individuals from the treatment group drop out from the academy. We do not collect any data from this group after the application form.

We collect data at several stages.

First, we collect data on personal information, contacts, and cognitive ability, overconfidence, and on dealing with failure at the information sessions in a pen and paper survey filled out by students attending an information session on their own.

Second, we collect data on an application form from those who apply in a pen and paper-based application form. The form asks for more personal information, on entrepreneurship (reasons for entering entrepreneurship, status of own business idea, business experience, field of business, business networks, liquidity constraints, knowledge of funding opportunities for start-ups, access to loans), on expectations of future earnings when running a business versus when being employed. Lastly, the form also contains open ended questions on motivation to take part in the academy, beliefs about what makes a good entrepreneur, and information about own (potential) business idea.

We administer a baseline survey among the treatment and control group. This survey covers personal information, contact information, employment and business experience, measures of access to networks, personality traits measures, measures of personal initiative, entrepreneurial self-efficacy, unincentivized preference measures (risk, time, loss aversion), and measures of stress.

The same questions as in the baseline survey are also administered to the comparison group of students in classes where the academy was advertised but who decided not to come to the info session. The baseline survey is administered just after the application but before the participants learn about their admission status.

We administer an academy exit-survey at the time when each academy ends with individuals from the treatment and the control group.

We administer midline and endline surveys in 6 and 12 months after the academy ends. On top of all baseline questions, these surveys collect data on all primary and secondary outcomes which allows us to collect the same data repeatedly. Both surveys are administered in person.

We plan to apply for additional funding to extend the tracking of individuals for a longer period. We would write a separate trial registration and pre-analysis plan for the possible extension.
Randomization Method
Randomization done in office by computer
Randomization Unit
Individuals
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
No cluster, individual level randomization.
Sample size: planned number of observations
1600 individuals for evaluation + 800 for comparison group
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
• Treatment group: 800 (40 per academy, for 10 universities with 2 academies each)
• Control group: 800 (40 per academy, for 10 universities with 2 academies each)
• Comparison group: 800
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Details in pre-analysis plan.
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Ethics Commission, Department of Economics, University of Munich
IRB Approval Date
2019-03-14
IRB Approval Number
Project 2018-07

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials