Are You Ready? »
About ‘Are You Ready’ »
Partners
Partners
Please see below details of the range of businesses, entrepreneurs and partner agencies who are supporting the ‘Are You Ready?’ campaign.
Carl Hopkins
I established Joblink Solutions CIC in order to help prepare young people, 14 years+, for a life in enterprise.
We aim to do this by fanning the flames of their own entrepreneurial spirit or by increasing their employability chances by adding to their academic achievements.
When I saw the ‘Are You Ready?’ programme and the positive effect it has on teachers and pupils, some as young as 6 years old, I saw this as a natural extension of our aims and I wished to support this award winning enterprise initiative.
Claire Young
I live, breathe and eat business! I enjoy taking ideas from my head and turning them into reality. I’m competitive and thrive off challenges, working out solutions and overcoming barriers. There’s nothing better than being your own boss. As a young business woman I am keen for students and teachers to understand what enterprise is, its value and how it can help them. Being enterprising isn’t about starting a business, there’s a wider aspect to the subject. Employers are crying out for skills such as teamwork, planning, organisation, leadership, being proactive – the list goes on. These are all enterprise skills! So regardless of what a student’s chosen career path is after school enterprise will help students develop confidence, critical life skills and hopefully help in getting the first step on the ladder. The ‘Are You Ready?’ campaign is a gift from god – it’s win-win for schools and students. I’m up for it and so I suppose the question is..are you ready?
Enternships.com
www.enternships.com provides students and graduates with an opportunity to learn about business and enterprise through work placements in entrepreneurial and innovative environments, from start-ups to global venture funds around the world.
Enternships.com formally launched in 2009 and is growing rapidly. More than 3000 companies in over 20 countries have used Enternships to find graduate talent, including companies like Groupon, PayPal and celebrities like Martha Lane Fox of LastMinute.com and James Caan and Peter Jones of Dragons Den.
Enterprise Lab
Enterprise Lab was formed as a direct response to the emerging gap in skills between education, employment and enterprise.
The Skills Enrichment programme is a multi-tiered programme developed to support programming for young people of all abilities in Schools, Colleges, Universities and NEETs and Community programming. Skills Enrichment delivers better experience and skills in Social Engagement, Leadership & Self Leadership, Employability and Enterprise.
Working with job providers, our programmes are delivered to support, align, precede and succeed making it one of the most flexible and rewarding programmes available. Above all this, Enterprise Lab also run a scheme incubating and empowering young entrepreneurs by delivering key business principles and skills to encourage business success and exponential growth.
Enterprise Lab now have a national presence in the UK with projects taking them internationally to Spain, Turkey and parts of Africa, developing programmes for Enterprise Eco-Systems; having the backing and support of the Conservative Party, Department of Business, Skills and Innovation and affiliations with many education and enterprise agencies our ethos is to enhance employability and encourage enterprise through sustained programming.
Enterprise Lab will be hosting a landmark event in 2012 called Youth Enterprise Live, this event will be held at Earls Court in October 2012 targeted at 15-30yr olds focussing on the 3E’s – Enterprise, Education and Employability. The event has been designed to showcase opportunities, provide inspiration, advice and guidance to young people in making positive decisions and choices in supporting their future development.
Grant Ridley
At age 20 I have had an incredible start to my entrepreneurial journey. Winning an Enterprise UK competition at college gave me the
entrepreneurial bug and I’ve since went on to graduate Peter Jones’ Enterprise Academy achieving the ultimate accolade of Manchester & National Entrepreneur 2011; not to mention National Overall BTEC Student of the Year from millions. Business & Enterprise is my passion and some would say obsession, I’m always thinking about how something could be turned into a money making opportunity.
Now running GR Marketing & Toonpreneur, I combine my love of marketing with promoting the importance of enterprise within my region and across the UK. I don’t believe, I KNOW it is extremely important to have enterprising teachers in our schools and colleges because that’s where my journey began. One enterprising teacher in Newcastle, enthusiastically encouraging business and entering me into an enterprise competition has led me to where I am today!
I’m excited to be involved with the ‘Are You Ready?’ campaign and want to support it through sharing my story and experiences. Are You Ready? I AM!” You can follow my journey on Twitter @grantridley
Hull Youth Enterprise
Who are the Hull Youth Enterprise Partnership?
The Hull Youth Enterprise Partnership is a well established public/private/community partnership set up to influence major partners in supporting Hull’s enterprising young people. It is committed to the shared vision of growing the City’s economy for the benefit of our young people and by working in partnership to create and facilitate opportunities to widen the entrepreneurial spirit of Hull.
What is the Purpose of the Hull Youth Enterprise Partnership?
Its primary purpose is to support and encourage young people aged up to and including 21 years of age to become more enterprising and to contribute to the City’s target of creating 1,200 new businesses, and will assist young people to overcome economic and social barriers that deny them the opportunity of economic inclusion, progression and choice.
The Youth Enterprise Partnership’s vision is: To secure a positive and sustainable future for the City and its young people through decisive leadership, partnerships and the support of active and empowered young people.
The Youth Enterprise Partnership’s aims are:
· To enhance the competitiveness of Hull’s businesses run by young people.
· To rebuild Hull’s young entrepreneurial culture
in2schools
in2schools.co.uk was set up by people who want to make a positive difference to the school days of pupils and teachers across the UK. As teachers ourselves, we understand the demands of the classroom and know how time pressed teachers are. That is why our online directory and Sought After Service are completely independent and free for nurseries, schools and colleges to use.
By making it as easy as possible to find exciting and educational services such as INSET training, pupil workshops and enrichment day events, we hope that teachers are inspired to bring a little bit of the outside world to their classroom and enhance the curriculum and learning experiences for their students.
We believe that in order to engage pupils, education needs to be inspiring and educators need to be passionate and we don’t think we can quantify the inspiration and passion that oozes from the Are You Ready? team.
@in2schools
Innovative Enterprise
Innovative Enterprise has been delivering workshops with schools throughout the UK since 2006 helping over 25,000 students develop their enterprise and career-skills, business awareness and decision-making abilities. We also have programmes to help with job or university interview skills, confidence building, financial literacy, motivational skills, understanding the environment and PSHE/citizenship.
An Innovative Enterprise event is all about learning by doing using role-play, games, multimedia input and examples from the real world all wrapped up in an engaging and challenging activity. Students are not ‘talked at’ – they are always active participants.
The format of each workshop is completely flexible – we’ll tailor it to your precise needs whether that be in terms of activity levels, academic standards or, of course, the aims of your enterprise culture and curriculum; all at no extra cost.
We also supply learning resources; Enterprise Soapbox is by far our most successful resource with over 400 schools having purchased it so far. It has been adapted for KS2 and also used as a Management Training tool for SLT’s.
Milieu is our PSHE/Citizenship game which is ideal for use in General Studies or during form time.
Momentum
Momentum is a not for profit social enterprise which creates personal development and international networking opportunities for young people. We have a track record of working with students and teachers across the country and in Europe, and our work aligns itself with formal education and those who support enterprising work in schools. We put a strong emphasis on business and enterprise, so working in partnership with ‘Are You Ready?’ adds massive value to the work we do. That is why we are proud to support the ‘Are You Ready?’ campaign.
MyBnk
What were you never taught in school, but needed the most?
How to manage your money, how to start a business.
With teachers, youth workers, financial experts and young people, MyBnk design and deliver money and enterprise programmes directly to 11-25 year olds in schools and youth organisations in London, the North East and North West.
MyBnk brings financial education to life by developing young people’s ideas and passions into real life businesses using real money:
MyBnk-in-a-Box is the UK’s first independent and FSA approved in-school/online banking scheme. Young people are trained to help fellow students save money and start businesses with interest-free loans.
Enterprise-in-a-Box helps creates social entrepreneurs with all-inclusive ‘how to…’ toolkit and Business Battle puts their enterprise skills to the test in a one week drawing board to public market challenge!
From creating a business plan and budgeting to product development and sales techniques, we teach young people everything they need to know to turn their ideas into a reality. 
“I opened an account to make money! I save at home but here it is safe and I can build it up. I think I will apply for a loan to run a little business”. Malachi Bellot-Hdges, 12, Forest Gate Community School, Waltham Forest, opening his MyBnk-in-a-Box account with £2.70.
“MyBnk has made me realise that you can set up your own business even in the recession. We have done this with a £40 budget so you can still do it”. Sekai Akinola, 15, Enfield Business Battler
Operation Enterprise
Ali Golds is a serial entrepreneur with several successful businesses under her belt, including a thriving interior design business and a media agency. In 2009, Ali decided to put her wealth of business knowledge to good use by training as a business and management lecturer at Exeter College, earning an honorary mention from the examiners for her research project. Upon completing the course Ali stayed at the college as a business lecturer, winning the Ted Wragg Award for Outstanding New Teacher 2009.
Ali quickly became the college’s sounding board for students with their own business ideas. Ali has a knack for spotting a gap in the market, and realised there was a real need for practical help and support for these young people. In 2010, Ali founded The Enterprise Club, a series of informal teaching and mentoring sessions held at the college by established business owners and designed to grow and develop the businesses of her students.
The Enterprise Club quickly gathered momentum, with other colleges in the area also wanting to take part. Demand became such that in 2011, Ali left teaching to begin Operation Enterprise, her own business specialising in delivering enterprise programmes, networks seminars, and a yearly conference. Operation Enterprise now helps college students, as well as others, who require the skills and experience of established small and medium business owners in order to start, and develop their own businesses – both for, and not for, profit.
A number of exciting collaborations are currently in the pipeline, and future plans for the company include a venture capital company for young people, as well as Operation Enterprise Summer Schools for teenagers, and business incubation units.
Parents in the Loop
Parents in the Loop is a website dedicated to parents in South Yorkshire with children at secondary school. It is designed to inform parents of the key moments in school life so that they can plan ahead. It directs parents to information provided by schools and to information across the web on each key moment. The aim is to help raise the aspirations of young people in South Yorkshire by engaging and informing their parents.
Parents in the Loop is working with ‘Are You Ready?’as we believe the two programmes compliment each other and it will enable us to raise the aspirations of more young people across the region.
Square Daisy
Square Daisy is a small Creative Agency that was set up by three friends. When the economy took a turn for the worst you can either look for a job or create your own, which is what we did at Square Daisy. We believe that young people should be made aware of enterprise and self employment as a real option and because of this we support the ‘Are You Ready?’ programme and anything that builds knowledge, understanding and confidence in young people to start their own businesses and create jobs and wealth for the future.
StartUp Britain
StartUp Britain is a campaign by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, harnessing the expertise and passion of Britain’s leading business people to celebrate, inspire and accelerate enterprise in the UK.
It has the full backing of the Prime Minister, the Chancellor and HM Government, as well as their 2011 founding sponsors: AXA, Barclays, Dell, Intel, Intuit, Microsoft, MITIE and PayPal.
They are truly passionate about promoting enterprise and do this by highlighting the myriad of support that is currently available, galvanizing support where they feel there is not enough and by using their links to Government to feedback on issues around small business support.
Why ‘Are You Ready?’
We searched for the Best Enterprise Support Project in the UK, one which supported enterprise locally, yet had the scalability and ambition to grow to provide support across the country. Whilst there was much competition, ‘Are You Ready?’ stood out to us and the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award judges for their tenacious efforts at creating a culture of enterprise in education from an early age. Not only this, but they have a true passion to expand their programme across the country and have the plans in place to achieve this.
Jamie Williams, StartUpBritain
STEPteam
The STEPteam programme was created to raise the aspirations of children and introduce them to the business world at a young age. Aimed at primary school children (years 5 and 6), it not only teaches them the basics of business, but also gives them the opportunity to run a real and profitable business of their own, with real products and real profits.
The ultimate goal of the programme is to create that initial spark in the children so that, regardless of their social background or circumstances, they might think: “I can do that!”.
Everything has been created with a view to making it as easy as possible for a teacher to pick up the project and deliver it without having to source additional materials – we even supply prize packs and certificates for the students!
The ‘Are You Ready?’ Team create amazing motivation and ‘desire to inspire’ within the teachers that they work with. It is fantastic that we have been able to support them by providing materials for the newly inspired individuals to work with – and we look forward to being able to introduce some of our schools to the ‘Are You Ready?’ Team in the future.
Virgin Media Pioneers
Virgin Media Pioneers brings young entrepreneurs together to learn, share and connect. We believe that enterprise education should start early and ‘Are you Ready?’ is a fantastic programme that does that by injecting entrepreneurialism into schools.
Voidcomp
Voidcomp is a creative business.
Two very different words. As creatives we push ourselves artistically and technically for reasons seldom based on financial rewards. It is for the emotional connection of creating, the pleasure we derive from being in our element, from striving to reach the highest goals in our work.
To create to the highest levels we need more. We have to be professional, healthy, secure and dependable.
This requires a different mindset, another toolbox of skills. Enterprise skills. It’s the business of being creative.
These skills can seem unnatural, confusing and unnecessary to creatives. At Voidcomp we embrace these disciplines because of the high standards we expect from each other and ourselves. However the journey to acquiring these tools can be unnecessarily difficult, if they can be found at all.
We work and communicate with young people on a regular basis. This is one of the reasons the company is fresh, diverse and passionate. Regrettably we see a lack of core enterprise skills, especially from media graduates.
‘Are You Ready?’ provides these essential skills through all tiers of education. After working with their team on a series of projects and seeing the impact their campaign has made first hand we are proud to sponsor one of the core enterprise themes.
Social Enterprise Europe
Social Enterprise Europe is one of the founding companies of social enterprise in the UK and Europe. We believe that we live in an unsustainable world threatened by financial and environmental disaster and that social enterprise, the business of creating wealth with shared values, ethics and social objectives is the only way forward. Over the past couple of decades we have extended our work across Europe and into Asia and Africa, developing courses, working with schools, working with communities and government agencies. We have a team of trainers, consultants and researchers and Directors in four countries. We also have Social Licence agreements with a number of organisations in Europe, Africa and Asia.
www.socialenterpriseeurope.co.uk