YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS SPRING INTO ACTION TO COMBAT COVID-19
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The sudden and unexpected onset of Covid-19 has changed the face of how we live, work, and learn in a very short space of time. Schools, workplaces, and centres of economic activity have come to a grinding halt, with countries around the world going into periods of lockdown to combat this dreadful virus. World economies are under serious threat, and it is anticipated that small businesses will be most negatively affected.
But it does not have to be all doom and gloom, right?!
We can either go into isolation and wait for things to return to normal, or as young people we can use the time to stretch our creative entrepreneurial thinking to developing sustainable solutions to the many challenges which our families, communities, towns, and countries are very likely to face now and also once we start assembling our lives after Covid-19.
As such, we have developed the SA Teen Entrepreneur Trust Covid-19 Idea Challenge, targeting high schools/senior schools across the world to proactively produce post Covid-19 workplans to build, uplift, restore, and revitalise their communities.
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PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT’S RCL CONFERENCE FOCUSSES ON YOUTH ISSUES
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The Western Cape Provincial Government’s Representative Council of Learners’ (RCL) Conference, held in early March, focussed on relevant issues such as learner attitudes; E-Learning opportunities and challenges for learners; social media, substance abuse and learner wellbeing; and school safety and learner discipline, amongst others.
SA Teen Entrepreneur had a slot on the programme, and talked to young people about the impact of the 4th Industrial Revolution on our changing economy. We also used the opportunity to present an Idea Generation exercise to give participating learners an insight into the running of our programme. Needless to say, they gave us positive feedback, and expressed a keen interest on starting Entrepreneur Societies at their schools.
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We’d like to thank the Education Department for integrating SA Teen Entrepreneur into your 2020 Conference Programme!
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EASTERN CAPE #TEENBOSS
A BOOMING SUCCESS
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Since our initial meeting in 2019, our partners in the Eastern Cape have always expressed a keen interest in using entrepreneurship to transform the lives of youth in the province. And they brought that excitement to #TEENBOSS earlier this month!
There were many budding entrepreneurs in the room who were brimming with novel ideas to bring change to their communities and learning environments. The 2-day #TEENBOSS programme culminated in a presentation of business ideas which ranged from recycling and upcycling solutions for waste products and materials, care-based programmes for the elderly, career guidance for the youth, and tutoring and after-care programmes for toddlers and young children, to name a few.
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Thank you for participating S.E.K Mqhayi High School, ZK Matthews Senior Secondary School, Ebenezer Majombozi High School, Hector Petersen High School, Qhasana Senior Secondary School, and Khulani Commercial High School. EVERYONE is a winner!!
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WE’RE MOVING APACE TO COMPLETE OUR
TEEN ENTREPRENEUR LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (TELMS)
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Covid-19 and the shutdown of schools around the country, and around the world, has precipitated our need to fast track the completion of our TELMS in order to make our entrepreneur content and learning solutions available to young people digitally. We are pleased with our progress to transform our course work into a digital format, and will be progressing into a testing phase with our active Entrepreneur Societies once schools re-open.
Learners will be required to complete a 16-question quiz to assess their existing business knowledge, which will determine their suitability to proceed to gain access to the full programme.
The purpose of the testing, or pilot phase, would be to highlight areas which require improvement, which features work best, as well as key benefits of the system when compared to traditional content-sharing methods. These findings will be applied prior to final release, with the anticipated launch date being late-July.
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SA TEEN ENTREPRENEUR TO PARTICIPATE IN
3M IMPACT PROGRAMME
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We reported in our previous issue that we were selected to benefit from 3M Impact’s Skills-Based Service Programme, a global pro bono project where diverse teams of 3M’ers travel to communities around the world to support projects by developing solutions to pressing social or environmental challenges. 3M, as many of you may know, is the American multi-national which operates in sectors such as worker safety, healthcare, and consumer goods.
The focus of the learnership will be in the area of financial sustainability, and we are confident that when the project concludes, we will be in a much-improved position to increase potential and new funding streams to meet our objective of ensuring that every high school in South Africa has an Entrepreneur Society which has the potential to change the plight of unemployment amongst our youth.
Thank you, 3M, we look forward to benefitting from your insights and experience!
Due to the Convid-19 pandemic, which is affecting all of us globally, the team from 3M have been unable to travel to South Africa to start our learnership programme. We are excited to host them in Cape Town in the near future.
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SUPPORT US TO GROW OUR PROGRAMME
We believe in the work that we do, we see it changing the lives of young people, we see how they in turn are able to re-invest what they have learned into their communities.
We therefore call on our loyal readers/champions/partners/stakeholders to assist us in our fundraising initiative.
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Or share this link with the people in your circle to make it possible for us to reach more young people across the country, and the continent digitally!
Thank you for your ongoing support!
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AN APPEAL FOR YOUR SUPPORT…
At Teen Entrepreneur we have seen what can be achieved when our partners rally around us to give support to our cause. We’d like to make an appeal to you again to please support SA Teen Entrepreneur as part of the MySchool Programme. If you are a supporter, and already have a beneficiary, we’d like to remind you that you are able to support up to 3 charitable organisations.
Your contribution is appreciated and can impact the sustainability of our programme significantly. If you are not a MySchool supporter yet, please sign up here:
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