BiG Challenge Winners Head For Harvard

 

Excited pupils from Myers Grove School are looking forward to a five star trip to Harvard University in Boston USA after winning the top prize at the BiG Challenge awards.

 

The BiG Challenge, part of BiG – Make it Your Business, is a competition designed to encourage and generate enterprise in education. Each team of pupils received £25 to start and run their business over a six month period.  Their objective was to increase that amount by as much as possible with teams being judged on their teamwork, innovation and entrepreneurship.

 

Bitz and Boblets, a team of seven Y9 pupils, designed and made their own original, silver-plated jewellery and won three BiG Challenge awards. As well as selling at school, the team sold their jewellery at a hair salon in Broomhill, Hillsborough Leisure Centre, Morrison’s in Hillsborough, ASDA in Handsworth and at the Inspiring Women event at the Kenwood Hotel.

 

‘Bitz n Boblets’ are: Olivia Naylor, Holly Young, Olivia Hancock, Ellis Ridge, Amy Hewitt, Evie Wilcock and Jessica Pollard. They made £1279.60 total profit which will go to St Luke’s Hospice.

 

“I can’t believe it” says Holly Young, “We’re so excited about going to Harvard, this whole project has been fun all the way through, we can’t recommend it enough!”.

 

John Wilkinson, Headteacher at Myers Grove said: “This has been a fantastic opportunity for our pupils.  The BiG Challenge is about raising aspirations, building self esteem and equipping pupils with the desire to become successful in business.  The awards ceremony was a chance for us to celebrate all the pupils’ tremendous success, get them even more excited about business.”

 

“The pupils have really thrown themselves into the BiG Challenge and the school has been right behind them. We will certainly be encouraging our pupils to enter again next year.”

 

Kevin Bennett, Director of BiG, said: “The young people involved in the BiG Challenge have been fantastic.  Not only have they raised a significant amount for charity - the teamwork and business skills they have shown will be extremely important when they leave school.

 

“As part of our programme to support people in business, we need to encourage enterprise and entrepreneurship from a young age. The pupils in schools and colleges are future business and economic leaders for Sheffield. By getting young people involved in business and encouraging them to be enterprising, we can show pupils that it can be fun and exciting being an entrepreneur.”

 

Former Dragon’s Den contestant Levi Roots performed at the event.  He said: “These pupils have had a brilliant introduction to entrepreneurship. Getting a business off the ground is not an easy task but they have managed to make profits in just six months and they really seem to have enjoyed the experience. There is a great mix of people at these awards with boys and girls of many different ages from diverse backgrounds, which is extremely encouraging.”

 

“BiG – Make it Your Business is providing people who might not usually think of entrepreneurship with an ambition to set up and run their own businesses.”

 

The awards took place at Sheffield City Hall Ballroom with 350 attendees from the schools and the business community attending. The total prize fund was £100,000 with money going to the winning schools and the trip to Harvard, for the winning team.

 

180 teams from 18 schools and two colleges across Sheffield entered the BiG Challenge.  Many of these made three figure sums with the winning teams earning almost £7000 for charity.

 

There were prizes for best website, best presentation to the judges, best future potential and prizes for each age category.