In the working world, ‘assessment’ rarely involves silent exam halls or a pen and paper. Assessment as an adult is more likely to take the form of an oral presentation or the final submission of a report or tender. It’s probably, more often than not, a team effort. So it seems only appropriate that incorporated within our Grade 9’s assessment week this year was the pitching competition, or Lions’ Den, that marked the culmination of their Approaches to Learning Social Entrepreneurship Project.
Back in August 2023, I put out a call to the entrepreneurs among our parent community for mentors to support our Grade 9 Social Entrepreneurship Project. The response was both generous and impressive, with experts from a wide range of career sectors offering their time to mentor our student teams through their entrepreneurial project. Having formed themselves into teams based on their interest in a particular global issue, the students carried out research into global, national and local problems associated with their chosen topic. With their background knowledge, they identified a more specific issue and brainstormed ideas that could go some way towards solving this problem, carrying out research throughout the process to support, reject or broaden their concept.
Each group met three times with their mentor, who guided them first on the feasibility of their idea, then how to pitch the idea for investment and finally coaching the team to improve their pitch. There is no doubt from the Grade 9’s reflections that these mentor meetings were hugely valuable, not only for the development of their ideas but also from the discussions they had about their mentor’s own career journey.
After only 11 hours of lesson time for preparation, the teams were thrown into the Lions’ Den to give their pitches, first to their peers in a semi-finals and then to four judges from our parent entrepreneur volunteers, competing for investment in their project. After some challenging questions, the judges deliberated and announced their investment decision as follows:
- 60% investment went to Lirit, Oren, Mariia and Kyle’s project to tackle mental health and stress in school through a meditation programme;
- 30% investment went to ‘Safe Cycle’ – Liesbeth, Lyra, Florence and Elli – whose ambitious project aimed to both reduce cycle theft in Leipzig and encourage cycling through partnership with large sports organisations to provide secure bike parking, managed through an app which offered money-off vouchers at food outlets;
- 10% investment for Johann, Artem and Aliaksandr, whose project aimed to support victims of cyberbullying through a website offering support and connecting victims to therapists.
Well done to all the teams and a huge thank you to the mentors and judges.