Fostering Social Justice in Entrepreneurial Education Through the Instrumentation of Instructional Leadership in Secondary Schools

Author Information

Ngozi Blessing Enebe, North-West University, South Africa
June Monica Palmer, North-West University, South Africa

Abstract

The traditional approach to instructional leadership in entrepreneurship education (EE) instruction has predominantly concentrated on business skills. Consequently, with this approach, schools risk reproducing individualistic or purely market-centric entrepreneurs that sideline civic purpose and social impact. This conventional model of instructional leadership tends to sustain and reinforce the exploitative tendencies inherent in capitalism. The purpose of this study is to investigate how instructional leaders can embed social justice principles in entrepreneurial education, thereby promoting equity, inclusivity, and fairness in teaching methods and curriculum delivery. The study employs Jack Mezirow's transformative learning theory to reconceptualize entrepreneurial education not merely as a means of imparting business skills but as a catalyst for societal and personal transformation culminating in a socially just society. Utilizing a conceptual framework and an integrative literature review methodology, the study synthesizes insights from relevant literature published between 2010 and 2025, sourced from Wiley, Scopus, ERIC, and Taylor and Francis online databases. The findings indicate that instructional leaders in schools lack the requisite understanding and expertise to effectively integrate social justice into entrepreneurship pedagogy. The study recommends that instructional leaders should be empowered to develop the competencies necessary to incorporate social justice into the pedagogy of entrepreneurial education, thereby fostering socially responsible instructional leadership and schools that are socially transformative. It is anticipated that these findings will inform both policy and practice where policies prioritise and address social inequalities, and entrepreneurship education is seen as a tool for nurturing values like fairness and equity.

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