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Parents hope that schools will equip their children with the knowledge, skills and critical thinking abilities needed to thrive in the real world. But all too often that isn\u2019t the case. For example, in the UK, a recent survey<\/a> found that over 70% of parents said the education system puts too little emphasis on preparing young people for work and 84% said it did not focus enough on life skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how can educators better prepare students to not only do well academically, but also  flourish, professionally and personally, once they\u2019ve graduated?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is something Aiglon College teachers Jack George, Assistant Head, Discovery, Ann-Marie Thomson, Head of Enterprise, and Darren Wise, Director of IT, have thought about a lot. \u201cFor many years now, Mr Wise and I have spoken about how we think schools will need to pivot more towards inquiry-led, project-based learning, if they\u2019re going to help students acquire the skills and competencies necessary for the future world of work,\u201d Mr George says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year, with the introduction of a project-based course for Year 9<\/a> students focused on entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship, Mr George, Ms Thomson and Mr Wise are putting these thoughts into practice. The course \u2014 called Enterprise Fusion <\/em>\u2014 covers many relevant business and startup-related concepts, and will see students develop their own product or service and follow the steps to bring their ideas to market. \u201cIt\u2019s going to give students the chance to learn about business concepts like design thinking, market research, financial planning, prototyping, but then they\u2019ll also apply what they\u2019re learning as they work on their extended projects,\u201d Mr Wise explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The course will also complement some of the work happening in other classes, such as computing, and allow students to deepen their knowledge by applying their learning in practical situations. \u201cThe course offers students the opportunity to gain technical skills in areas such as game design, web design, app design, rapid prototyping, 3D printing\/making and CAD\/CAM as they gain skills capable of creating their product,\u201d says Mr Wise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To kick things off, students on the course recently took part in a Start-Up Day<\/em> \u2014 an opportunity for them to gain an overview of some of the concepts they\u2019ll be learning about. \u201cIt was almost like a film trailer for the entire course,\u201d Mr George says of the event. \u201cThey got to dip into loads of different things, so they have a basic idea of the story, but now, over the coming weeks and months, they\u2019ll be going deeper, and getting into the nitty gritty.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the start of the event, students were asked to think about startup ideas for the home. They then got to workshop these with guidance from eight experts: four Aiglon alumni who have successfully set up and scaled their own businesses and four members of the Art Tech Foundation<\/a>, a Swiss network of entrepreneurs. \u201cIt was fascinating to watch the entrepreneurs encouraging students to break down their big ideas and pushing them to think about the details, like how one tiny design flaw could lead to a much bigger failure,\u201d says Ann-Marie Thomson. \u201cAt first, students were a little taken aback, with some feeling that their work was being criticised but they very quickly realised that, actually, the entrepreneurs really loved their ideas, they were just trying to get them to think about them more deeply.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s these types of skills \u2014 identifying a problem, coming up with a solution for it, iterating, and then being able to implement it \u2014 that are so sought after in the world of work. And it\u2019s these types of skills that Mr Wise thinks students will develop throughout the course. \u201cSo many courses involve students being led along a path, so their learning is very directed and dictated,\u201d Mr Wise says. \u201cActually, when you give them a blank piece of paper and equip them with the right skills, they can find their own way.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That approach complements Aiglon\u2019s broader educational philosophy, Mr George believes. \u201cTraditional education assumes linear progression; Aiglon is a development school, and we offer a bespoke way for students to write their own story.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the results from Start-Up Day<\/em> are anything to go off, the students could write some very interesting stories by the end of this course. \u201cEveryone at the event was amazed by what a group of 13-year olds managed to achieve in one day,\u201d says Mr Wise. \u201cThey went from pretty much zero at the beginning of the day to having a finished presentation to showcase to the audience. Some of the entrepreneurs said what the students presented wasn\u2019t too far off what they\u2019ve seen in the real world, with real projects.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t just the entrepreneurs who left feeling optimistic about what the students might go on to achieve. \u201cStart-Up Day<\/em> was like a big, exciting adventure into the world of business, and it showed me how fun and cool it can be to come up with new ideas and make them happen,\u201d says Yuina, one of the students who took part in the event. \u201cIt made me feel more confident, like I could really try starting my own business one day and maybe even make something awesome!\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Parents hope that schools will equip their children with the knowledge, skills and critical thinking abilities needed to thrive in the real world. But all too often that isn\u2019t the case. For example, in the UK, a recent survey found that over 70% of parents said the education system puts too little emphasis on preparing young people […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12303,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n