The innovative educational program has been taking the entrepreneurial mindset to elementary schools since 2018. WU students slip into the role of mentors, showing children between the ages of 8 and 10 what it means to start and run your own business. Instead of dry theory, the program is all about trial and error, experimentation, and hands-on learning.

In two workshops, children develop a business idea, design their own products, and learn how to sell them. They are given tips on creativity, marketing, and pricing – and get to try everything out right away. Teachers accompany the process in the classroom and ensure that the economic mindset becomes an integral part of the learning experience in the long term.

A highlight of the program is the “Markttag” (Market Day) on the WU campus, where the classroom ideas are transformed into tangible products that the children sell at market stalls. Here the young people experience the entrepreneurial spirit, become changemakers – and are given a taste of university life.

The concept works: More than 5,800 children in 440 classes have already taken part in the program, guided by 780 WU students. The Changemaker Program is now offered in all nine Austrian states with the support of partner universities. In 2023, the program received a €200,000 award from the education foundation MEGA Bildungsstiftung, and in 2024, Monique Schlömmer and Rudolf Dömötör, the program heads, were honored as Entrepreneurship Educators of the Year.

The awards are a nice bonus, but they aren’t what the program is about. The aim is to give children the message: Your ideas matter. You can make a difference. And that’s exactly what the Changemaker Program does – a small project making a big impact.