News Lower Sixth students present ideas to LSE Generate Mentorpreneurship Judges 21.04.2023

Congratulations to the ten teams of Lower Sixth students who just before Easter presented their ideas to the panel of LSE Generate Mentorpreneurship judges and to an audience of attentive Year 10 students. We heard a variety of polished presentations on themes ranging from helping local Year 6 pupils to improve their communication skills through debating workshops; connecting Year 1 and 2 pupils into activity sessions to boost physical wellness; supplying art equipment to those who are not fortunate enough to have easy access; to the concept of delivering cookery masterclasses that will in turn provide meals for local community groups.

The LSE Generate Mentorpreneurship programme is our new programme for Lower Sixth students who were challenged with developing an evidence based initiative with the potential to create positive impact within a segment of society or local community. The purpose of this programme has been two-fold: to support students to engage with the world beyond their norm but also to develop skills and mindsets valuable to them both now and in the future. Weekly workshops at school have focused on helping students understand the problem that they are interested in, developing empathy through audience needfinding, hypothesising a solution supported by a range of evidence, extolling the benefit of rethinking and iterating ideas based upon feedback and learning the art of the pitch. All of this has revolved around the content created by the students.

Throughout this process the teams of Lower Sixth students have been supported by mentors associated to LSE Generate and they have gained huge insight from these experts. This Mentorpreneurship approach has seen our students present to and receive feedback from socially responsible venture capitalists, socially driven entrepreneurs, start-up founders and socially responsible investment specialists. The collaboration is part of the schools G&L Futures programme which provides real-life problem-solving challenges to help our students become pioneers of the future.

Congratulations to the teams who remained committed to the programme from November 2022 through to March 2023; we now look forward to following their progress as they bring their ideas to life over the coming weeks and months.