Beyond the classroom
It takes an ecosystem to raise a new generation of innovators and entrepreneurs ready to navigate the complexities of a rapidly changing world.
By Jen Waters
Our schools are brimming with bright young minds with big ideas for the future – and with the right foundation and ongoing support, the possibilities are boundless.
A collaboration between Macquarie University Incubator and Sydney-based social enterprise Young Wisdom aims to bridge the support gap for young founders and unlock this potential. Uniquely designed to empower young people with the future-proof skills of innovators and entrepreneurs, the Secondary Schools Program cultivates life skills such as creative and critical thinking, teamwork and communication to find workable solutions to important problems and mobilise people and organisations behind their cause.
“Our program doesn’t just encourage students to think outside the box; it dismantles the box entirely,” explains Melissa Ryan, Director of Incubation & Entrepreneurship at Macquarie.
“We prepare our students to ask the questions that challenge the status quo, see failure as a valuable opportunity for learning and growth and embrace conflict as a catalyst for collaboration and development. We’re not just equipping students for the world of entrepreneurship; we’re preparing them to lead, innovate and inspire in any field.”
All roads lead to growth
The Secondary Schools Program offers a suite of face-to-face and online opportunities for high school students, from those wanting to explore their creative and entrepreneurial side to those actively building real startups. Among these is Startup Club, with weekly video calls providing direct and regular access to expert startup coaches and mentors, learning crucial entrepreneurial concepts and skills and workshopping individual challenges as a group.
There are also intensive three-day mini-accelerator school holiday programs for startup founders, and a program of highly sought-after Bootcamp Excursions in which groups of six students from up to six schools converge at the MQ Incubator for a full day of discussion and hands-on workshops. According to Young Wisdom Founder Shahe Momdjian, the bootcamps are an inspiring experience.
“It’s a full-day immersion in innovation and entrepreneurship – students collaborate with others they’ve never met before, they explore ideas and solutions, define a reasonable business model, develop and deliver a pitch to a judging panel,” he says.
“Accompanying teachers have been consistently impressed by the journey their students go through in a single day, the rich insights they gain into entrepreneurial life, and the final pitches they are able to build and deliver in such a limited timeframe. We also show them a more inclusive view of what makes a startup or an entrepreneur; it’s not just about tech startups going global or pitching to Shark Tank – it can be any project where you’re trying to solve a problem in your life, your school, your community, in a creative, sustainable and stage-appropriate way.”
Student Startup Pitch Nights are another highlight, offering active startup founders in NSW high schools the chance to pitch to a real audience, gain offers of support, and build a thriving community to share the journey with. The inaugural Pitch Night was held at MQ Incubator on Thursday 11 April this year, with ten student-led startups pitching to an expert judging panel and a live audience as they vied for a $1,000 prize pool.
“It was a brilliant night showcasing the ingenuity and passion of a diverse group of young people working on an equally diverse range of problems and solutions that hold great potential,” Mr Momdjian recalls.
“There were many great ideas, from an app to assist teachers and students facing dyslexia to a cybersecurity solution to keep homes safe, and our grand prize winner – a young innovator turning humidity into electricity with a working prototype! While prizes are fun, best of all is that all students have access to our ongoing support via the Secondary Schools Program as they continue to explore, launch and scale their ventures.”
Amplifying accessibility and impact
The Secondary Schools Program is attracting students from Sydney and beyond, across the full spectrum of schools: public, private and independent, religious and secular, co-educational and single-sex. The feedback from teachers and students is overwhelmingly positive, with a clear demand for expansion.
Connor Maglis, Science/iSTEM Teacher at Sydney Secondary College (Balmain Campus), says students “thoroughly enjoyed the excursion (and) learned about a whole realm of entrepreneurship that they were previously unaware of. It is the perfect integration and supplementation to their education, and fills the gaps that our school has not yet explored.”
According to one student, who had previously attended other bootcamp-style events, “none of them matched this level of student interaction where we actually went through the design thinking process ourselves and did quick-fire empathising and ideation.”
Although the program’s reach and impact are growing fast, the focus is very much on quality engagement and building a thriving young founder community. Embedding in schools is crucial to extending its impact, and Teacher Roundtables and professional development opportunities are key components of the program. The team have also developed an ever-growing library of free resources supporting teachers to build the approach into their daily classroom activities.
“The ultimate goal is to extend our reach to benefit more students in more areas while creating an ecosystem that empowers a new generation of leaders, innovators and changemakers to translate their ideas into real-world positive impact,” Ms Ryan says.
Term 2 Secondary Student Programs
The Student Startup Bootcamps will take place on 31 May and 7 June. This is a one-day bootcamp. Complete the form to register your school. The Student Pitch Night will take place on 28 June and the Holiday Bootcamp will take place from 10 to 12 July. Please register your school’s interest by emailing incubator@mq.edu.au.