Year 8s Participate In Young Enterprise Morning

Last Tuesday, Year 8 students from Kingswood took part in the Young Enterprise morning and the Pavilion. The pupils were immersed in workshops to develop their employability skills.

They also received testimonials from experts that work in different sectors within industry, including; Lloyds Banking, the MOD, Kier, Aviva and KPMG.

Each team of students had to carefully assess the relative strengths of their teammates. They were then challenged to design a new shoe business, focusing on pricing and branding.

Working closely with their industry mentors, each team had to develop a catchy brand and a novel shoe design. With the pressure mounting, students worked right through their lunch to rehearse for the final activity of the day, a one-minute pitch. In this small amount of time, teams had to communicate their product and business concept to the rest of the students and the two judges, Miss Rolfe and Mrs Pasco.

The teams all produced high-calibre pitches, covering a wide variety of shoe businesses. Miss Rolfe and Mrs Pasco had a difficult time deciding who was worthy of the awards for innovation, team work, marketing and the strength of delivery.

Some of the highly commendable ideas included shoes that charge your phone as you walk, a shoe with a removable high-heel for both style and comfort and customisable, inflatable shoes.

Team Schwifty, who were named winners, designed unique, gender-neutral shoes.