
Acquisition of Volunteer Awareness in Potential Entrepreneur Candidates
Chapter from the book:
Özkaynar,
K.
&
Mecek,
M.
(eds.)
2025.
Theory, Research and Debates in Social Sciences - 1.
Synopsis
This study investigates the impact of the “Volunteer Studies” course, which was included in the 2020-2021 Fall Semester University course curriculum by the Republic of Turkey Ministry of Youth and Sports, on future potential entrepreneur candidates. The fact that there are almost no studies in the Turkish literature on students continuing their education in the field of International Trade and Finance suggests that the study will contribute to the field. The study was conducted with 39 4th-year university students enrolled in the “Volunteer Studies” course at the Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences at Afyon Kocatepe University. The students were asked to submit an “Activity Report” regarding the activities they carried out within the scope of the course. The activity report created by the students who were potential entrepreneur candidates as a result of their activities was evaluated and interpreted through content analysis. The research has the feature of a qualitative study. As a result, this course created a perception of entrepreneurship and volunteering awareness in entrepreneurship in students who were potential entrepreneur candidates. Students did not limit themselves only to the volunteer work they did, they also acquired gains such as teamwork and interdisciplinary behavior in order to catch up with the necessity of the age with the thought of what the extensions of these activities could be, how they could be more beneficial to the environment. They gained the feeling of touching other lives, comparing them with their own lives and being grateful. In fact, it is possible to express these gains as the most important values for today. It has been observed that the balance of nature, human and animal life, in short, the balance of the ecosystem, should be supported by volunteering activities and even sustainable volunteering activities.