Students in enterprise challenge

Rye College students enjoyed a fantastic business enterprise workshop, delivered by Young Enterprise’s Wendy Gorham, in preparation for this year’s Tenner Challenge.

Tenner Challenge teams at work

Tenner Challenge provides a highly interactive way for students to develop key skills including creativity, resilience, and problem solving, using real money to take calculated risks in business. Students (11-19) are pledged £10 and have one month to set up a business – coming up with an idea of a product or service they can sell and gain first-hand experience of what it’s like to be an entrepreneur.

As part of the workshop, groups of students were given a selection of five different materials from which to design their own marketable product: a paper clip, a bin bag, a plastic wallet, a straw and a plastic beaker. There were some fantastic results ranging from pen holders to rocket toys and bikinis to iPad cases. They also took part in a marketplace game involving a “bank loan” with which materials could be purchased from the “shop” to enable them to work as a team to measure, cut out and colour shapes and negotiate purchase prices with a buyer. Each group started with £80 in Young Enterprise pounds and the winning team ended up with a profit of just over £3,000 Young Enterprise pounds!

Freya, year seven representative of the winning team, said: “This workshop really helped us develop our economic and business skills, and now we are ready to be entrepreneurs in the Tenner Challenge.”

Principal Ian Gillespie commented, “It was great to see our young people so engaged in the tasks, smiling and having fun and learning teamwork, enterprise and employability skills to set them up for the future. We are discovering the next Dragon’s Den contestants, with some great ideas from Rye College Tenner Challenge students.”

Donna Starkey, Director of Extended Curriculum, would like to thank Wendy and Young Enterprise for this brilliant opportunity. The delivery was fantastic and our students thoroughly enjoyed the experience.

 

 

Photos: Rye College

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