Brightest and best – QE boys victorious

Three QE pupils have won a national competition which aimed to find the country’s brightest young businesspeople and entrepreneurs.

Step into Business is a new competition launched last June by the b-live Foundation and the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW). It was designed to build key employability skills.

Jaymin Thakrar, Akash Gandhi and Kapish Dave from Queen Elizabeth’s School have been named winners in the Years 10-11 category. A total of 159 schools nationwide entered the competition at this age group and in the Years 12-13 category, with 3,250 individual pupils taking part in the Step into Business lesson plan.

Step into Business was delivered as part of the Business Studies curriculum. It placed participants in the position of would-be investor – much like the ‘dragons’ in the successful BBC series Dragons’ Den. Teams were shown three new product ideas and given an imaginary £50,000 to invest in the one they considered most likely to succeed at market.

Through analysing each of the products’ financial viability and marketability, students were able to exercise key Business Studies skills including numeracy, literacy, teamwork, reflective learning, decision-making and leadership.

Tanja Kuveljic, Managing Director of the b-live Foundation, added: “The Step into Business initiative is an example of how we join up relevant organisations who are committed to supporting young people, education and schools to provide a curriculum-based exercise which helps schools to reach their attainment targets but also develops the employability of young people.”