SMART TEESSIDE STUDENTS WIN YOUNG ENTERPRISE CHALLENGE

ENTERPRISING Teesside students are in the running to be named Young Enterprise North East’s ‘Company of the Year’ after triumphing in the South Area Final this week.

Smarty Pants, a company set up by students from Teesside High School won the Best Overall Company award at the South Area Final where they pitched their business idea to a panel of judges.

The team will now go on to the Regional Final on 15 June with the chance to be named Company of the Year and represent the North East at the National Final held in London this July.

Smarty Pants produce quality audio CD revision guides and online resources for the GCSE science market. The company is currently seeking endorsement from the AQA examining board and it has already sold 200 copies to Darlington Building Society, who will distribute the product through its Young Savers scheme.

Smarty Pants joint managing director Rachel Goodier said: “We put so much work into our product, and trade stand so to win the Area Final was the icing on the cake. Thank you to Young Enterprise North East and our business advisers who helped us so much, we really appreciate it.”

Students from The English Martyrs School & Sixth Form College in Hartlepool also got through to the next round, with their business idea ‘Munchkins’.

Munchkins, launched by a group of year 12 business and textile students, produces personalised aprons and recipe books for children.

The students hope to target the product at parents to encourage them to cook with their children. They hope to promote in a similar way to Jamie Oliver's school dinners campaign to encourage children to learn how to cook for themselves and understand healthy options. They have already sold a number of the products in their own school and other local nurseries and primary schools.

Munchkins managing director Georgia Wilkinson said; “Setting up our own Young Enterprise company has been a brilliant experience. We have worked well as a team and all the hard work has now paid off by winning a place at the Regional Final. We are over the moon.”

Students from Stockton Sixth Form College were named as runners up and the Best Team Programme award went to students from Catcote Business and Enterprise School in Hartlepool.

The winning teams beat off stiff competition from the other student companies taking part including, ‘Boblania’ from Stockton Sixth Form College, ‘Elftopia’ from Prior Pursglove College in Guisborough, ‘Supercats’ and ‘Free Bikes for Africa’ from Catcote Business and Enterprise School in Hartlepool , ‘EDIT’ from The King’s Academy in Middlesbrough and ‘Green Machine’ from Darlington Education Village.

The schools are all taking part in YENE’s Company and Team (special needs) programmes, which sees students, establish a real company complete with products to sell, targets to reach, a board of directors and saleable shares.

At the Area Final, the students displayed their products and presented their business plans to the judging panel that included, ONE North East enterprise specialist adviser Angela Craggs, Business Link skills adviser Richard Asquith and business coach Peter Wilkinson.

They were judged on the quality of their company report, trade stand and pitch presentation.

Sponsors of the event included, Sunderland Software City, Sabic, Durham Business Club, Darlington Building Society and One North East.

Network event success

It was another great turnout at YENE’s Spring Networking Event, hosted by Dickinson Dees at its Quayside office. Over 40 people from businesses across the region gathered to network with fellow supporters and hear our latest news.

We were delighted to have inspirational guest speaker Juliette Lee present ‘Getting Engaged’, sharing inspirational tips and ideas to motivate and re-energise.

David Wilson gave an update on the newly formed YENE Volunteer Committee and board director David Haley spoke of the upcoming Regional Final, which will be held on Tuesday 15 June at the Gosforth Marriott hotel.

It was also great to see four Young Enterprise alumni amongst our guests, all now in successful careers with three of them running their own business.

Business lessons are out of this world

Last week I taught students aged seven and eight at Mount Pleasant Primary School, in Cockerton, Darlington, about business in the community, government and public finance.

The initiative, run under the auspices of Young Enterprise North East, is designed to help children understand how the adult world of business and finance works – and hopefully inspire them to go on to succeed through their own enterprise.

My lessons, run over five weeks, proved such a success that on the children’s final session I brought along Darlington FC footballer Gary Smith with me to present the youngsters with certificates.

I myself am a former human resources (HR) director and senior executive for some of the UK’s best-known companies, including WH Smith, Asda, Royal Mail, Ventura, Pearl Assurance and DSG International. In 2007, the she was recognised for her achievements in Personnel Today’s HR Director of the Year awards and featured in the publication’s Top 40 Powerful People in HR.

Now I run Strategic Change Solutions, a team of change management experts based in the North-East helping companies manage the changes needed to survive the recession, preserve jobs and flourish in the future.

The world of business may seem completely alien to children of their age, but they soaked up every last drop of knowledge and information I could give them about how, as adults, you get a job, earn money, pay tax, and how the Government spends that tax providing such things as the police, fire and ambulance services.

The sessions involved problem-solving, team work, communication and a strong element of numeracy, and I hope that along the way the children have picked up a few life skills that will serve them well in the future.

In truth, it’s been tremendous fun for me. The children have been full of enthusiasm from the first lesson to the last.

The groups I normally talk to groups consist of seasoned businessmen and women, who probably think they seen and heard it all before, but the only difficulty with the children at Mount Pleasant was keeping a lid on their enthusiasm.

Mount Pleasant teacher Karen Bateman said: “It is important that our children learn about the wider community from a different perspective and the responsibility we all share through our life’s work to make it a different and better world. The children loved every minute of Claire’s lessons. At times, they were as much an eye-opener for me as they were for them.”

Claire Walton, Strategic Change Solutions.