Trips

Make Your Mark

4 pupils from Belfast High achieved second place in the regional finals of Make Your Mark Challenge.  This is the largest simultaneous competition with over 40 000 students competing across the UK.  Their challenge was to “Create an entrepreneurial idea inspired by the Olympic and Paralympic Values”.  Their idea was extremely innovative, yet realistic.  Their presentation impressed all 3 judges who complimented their business acumen.   Jo Cameron from the TV programme, ‘The Apprentice’ presented the prizes.

The team consisted of:

Ross McClean
Ross Creighton
Stephanie Morrell
Karl Sullivan

Make Your Mark

 

Business Studies Trip to London – 23rd Jan 08

3 pupils from our school were chosen to go to London courtesy of Young Enterprise.  Amy Garrett, Jordan Humphreys and Peter Rea all met Miss Foster and the other schools at the George Best City Airport at 8:45am. We had a short wait until 10:20am when we boarded our flight to London Gatwick. Once we arrived at London Gatwick Airport, we boarded the Gatwick express train to London, which took around 30 minutes. Once we arrived at London Victoria train station, we got a quick bite to eat, and then met the Head of Young Enterprise Valerie Ingram.  Once we met up with Valerie, we walked over to a tour bus area, and boarded an open-top tour bus. We drove all around London until we reached our destination, The London Eye. We all ran off the bus eager to get onto the Eye. We all hopped onto a pod and slowly reached the top. It was an eye opening experience. Once back on the ground, we divided up into our different schools and each got a black cab to TGI Fridays, were we all had dinner. It was a quick run to get the bus back to the train station, but we missed it and had to get another black cab to the train station. We boarded the Gatwick express, and arrived in London Gatwick. Another short wait and we were on the plane back to Belfast.

By Amy Garrett

 

Social Enterprise Programme

This year 12 pupils from Year 11 were chosen to attend a 6 day course and competition provided by Young Enterprise Northern Ireland.  On our first day we headed for The Mount Conference centre.  We were given a talk about what a Social Enterprise was and what we could do to help our community.  We then split up into our different school, met our mentor Orla and started work on a presentation we were going to present to the other schools.  Our assignment was about OHYEAH Music Company and we had to think of a way of promoting the company.  Our idea was to get the people in Belfast together for a 2 day concert.  We presented our idea to the groups but unfortunately were beaten.  We all went for lunch and then we came back and started to work on the Business Plan.  None of us were quite sure exactly what we were doing but when we found out we got quite excited.  Our assignment was to create a social enterprise business which is basically a business that helps the people in our community.  The ideas were flowing out of us but one stood out in particular.  The idea of an under 18’s disco for teenagers was perfect because being teenagers ourselves we knew what teenagers want and need.  As soon as we had this idea we decided on team roles.  Sammy our Managing Director, Peter, Matt, Shannon and Hayleigh were on the Marketing team.  Amy, Danielle, Adam and Ross were on the Public Relations team and Laura G, Jordan and Laura C were on the Business Plan team.  We were all really pleased with our roles on the team and quickly started work on our under 18’s disco.  Before we knew it, it was time to go home.

 

Our second day on the course was held in the Waterfront Hall.  We had the opportunity to also visit social enterprise businesses.  The first business we visited was Common Grounds Café.  We then headed back on the bus for the OHYEAH music company building.  Then we headed to the Waterfront for lunch.  After lunch we got back into our groups and started work on our aims and objectives of the business.  In the end we completely changed our business idea.  We thought that there are a lot of things out there for teenagers to do but what about the complete opposite of teenagers?  The elderly.  That was it, this idea was going to get us first place.  We then decided on a name, and came up with T.E.A, The Elderly Association.  Some of the group weren’t at all happy with the idea but eventually we persuaded them.

Our third day we returned to The Mount, and went straight into our groups to work on the business.  We decided on our business aims and objectives and came up with our actual events and services we were going to introduce.  Our main event was Bingo, we chose this because it is a great way to get the elderly together, win prizes and even just come for the chat.

Our fourth day was a bit more difficult.  We had to start all our market research and finance areas of the business.  Once we had these underway our Public Relations team started work on the presentations.  The presentation was the main way of selling our business to the judges so the presentation was very important.

The last day of the presentation had arrived.  We were all running like mad to get things finished and organised.  We finally got things together and realised we were further ahead than we thought.  When the end of the day came we were confident we were going to get first prize.

Then the day we all had been looking forward to arrived. – Our presentation in Stormount.  After a few practices after school, we got everything in order.  Our business plan, our presentation and our display.  Everything was going to plan.  We were one of the last schools to present our idea and we thought we were in for a good chance when we heard some of the other school’s ideas.  Our presentation went perfectly. We were all quite nervous but were confident in ourselves and our idea.  Then it was crunch time, we waited to hear the results.  With Ballyclare coming in second we thought we were going to do it but unfortunately we lost to Newtownabbey Community School and their idea of “Recycle Rathcoole”.  We were disappointed but we did get the award for “Most understanding of Social Enterprise”, which we were happy with.

In conclusion, the Social Enterprise programme was a great achievement not only for the team but for the school.  It was a great experience and I hope it keeps running so pupils next year get the chance to experience the programme.  Of course it wouldn’t have been possible without the help and effort made by Miss Foster, Mrs Millar, Mr Coyles, our mentor Orla and of course, the TEA Team.

Amy Garrett