Jersey Business receives high impact award for schools project

Friday 19 December 2014

Jersey Business has been awarded High Impact status for its contribution to this year’s Global Entrepreneurship Week which this year engaged with 700 secondary school students.

The students were tasked in November with the challenge of developing a business idea that focused on reducing road traffic and improving the health and well-being of Islanders.

Global Entrepreneurship Week is organised by Youth Business International, a global network of independent non-profit initiatives helping young people to start and grow their own business and create employment.

Jersey Business advisors, local business people and entrepreneurs came together to act as mentors, providing valuable support and direction to the students to help them succeed in their tasks which involved teamwork, planning, research, concept creation and presentations. The week proved to be a huge success with both pupils, teaching staff and mentors alike and was instrumental in helping young people and business people connect on a collaborative platform with the aim of encouraging and developing on-going relations.

To be awarded High Impact status, the local initiative had to meet six criteria including how the event is promoted in the location and measuring the effect the activities organised during the week have on participants.

Graeme Smith, Chief Executive of Jersey Business said: "This is excellent news, not just for the team at Jersey Business but for all our budding entrepreneurs. We could not host Global Entrepreneurship Week without the support of our business mentors, facilitators and professional advisors who give up their time and expertise to make it such a huge success each year. This Award must also be shared with them and we thank them for their contribution."