HOMERTON MAKES ITS MARK FOR ENTERPRISE WEEK

Homerton College of Technology flew the flag for Hackney’s schools when it took part in ‘Make Your Mark,’ a challenge event that kicked off National Enterprise Week (14-20 November). That flag is still flying high as a team from the school prepares to contest the national final in December.

Schools from all over the country took part in the day – with the exact nature of the task kept a secret until the morning of the event. All participating schools, around 300 of them, received the brief simultaneously over the Internet.

To set the mood, the Year 10 Homerton students received a motivating presentation from Stafford Carrington, managing director of Impact IT and winner of the Black Enterprise Awards Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2005. Stafford talked to the boys about how he realised he wanted to start his own business but that he recognised he needed to start at the bottom and gain some experience before doing so.

At last, the ‘challenge’ was revealed. Students had to ‘Put Where You Live on the Map’ by coming up with a product, idea or service that would make their town famous and generate income.

Teams needed to construct a plan that showed their creativity in terms of ideas, supported by visuals. They had to show a costings sheet and pay attention to any market competitors as well as how they would promote their product or service.

Volunteers from UBS, Freshfields, the Learning Trust and Inspire were on hand to support the teams.

The winning group was judged to be Team 10 who came up with ‘H-Town Tee Shirts,’ aimed at local residents and which could be personalised with home post codes. The students then had a chance to present their idea at the London regional final held at law firm, Linklaters on Friday 18 November. The Homerton team triumphed and will now go forward to compete against 10 other regional finalists at the national final on 6/7 December. The prize will be £3,000 for the winning school.

The Make Your Mark National Enterprise Challenge was organised by Enterprise Insight, in conjunction with the National EBP Network, and implemented locally by Inspire, the education business partnership for Hackney.