Young entrepreneurs from three sixth forms across Birmingham have raised over £3,000 for Birmingham St Mary’s Hospice in a Dragon’s Den style initiative.
Over the past six months pupils from The Priory School, Kings Norton Boys and Kings Norton Girls Sixth Form competed against each other in the Hospice’s ‘Business Enterprise Challenge 2017’. This exciting fundraising initiative gave students the opportunity to put skills learnt as part of their business studies course into practice by setting up their own fundraising projects to try and raise the most money for the Hospice.
In a Dragon’s Den style event, students also showcased their skills pitching to representatives from Carillion, J W Hinks and DAC Beachcroft, who gave feedback on their enterprising ideas and provided mentoring support throughout the challenge.
Living up to their name by raising a whopping £1,959.54, ‘Team Ambition’ from Kings Norton Girls Sixth Form were proudly crowned 2017 champions. Their fundraising activities included a sponsored run and two Krispy Crème doughnut sales.
Business Studies teacher Joanne Neale from Kings Norton Girls School said: “The event has provided students with an excellent opportunity to develop transferrable skills and apply theory learnt in the classroom to real situations. They have improved their problem solving skills and resilience as they had to overcome a number of challenges. We are extremely proud of the hard work and motivation shown by our students to raise such a substantial amount of money over a short period of time.”
Funds raised from the Business Enterprise Challenge will enable Birmingham St Mary’s Hospice to provide free end of life care and support to local families living with terminal illness. It costs over £8 million per year to run the Hospice and over half of these running costs come from voluntary donations.
Pamela Hodgetts, Corporate Partnerships Coordinator at Birmingham St Mary’s Hospice said: “The scheme was a wonderful opportunity for the local community to work together for a great cause. We are really grateful to our business partners for taking on the roles of mentors and ‘dragons’ to help steer the students to success. It was really inspiring to see how passionate the teams were about raising money for the Hospice and we’d like to thank them for raising such an amazing amount.”
