BlueSky Enterprise Day 2008

The BlueSky Enterprise Day 2008 has been jointly organised by the Action Community for Entrepreneurship, Talentpreneur Hub and the Youth Enterprise Academy to dedicate a half-day event running entrepreneurship related programmes for youths. It was held on Friday,18th July 2008, at the Hwa Chong Institution. Students and teachers from more than 20 primary and tertiary institutes were invited to participate in workshops, board games and exhibitions. These programmes were aimed to engage youths in various activities to inspire them to realize the possibilities of creative ideas and turning them into avenues of wealth creation.




The BlueSky Enterprise Day is part of the BlueSky Festival which is held annually to run initiatives that encourage and foster the spirit of enterprise amongst Singaporeans, namely the youth.




Gracing the event was the Senior Minister of State for Education, RADM (NS) Lui Tuck Yew, acting as Guest of Honour and took a brief tour of the exhibition area.





At the exhibition, various schools also held exhibits side by side along with other business companies supporting the event such as Now Asia, Microsoft and KooBits. Talentpreneur Hub and the Youth Enterprise Academy were on site to present business development and education programmes which are in line with the vision of Spring Singapore’s initiative to integrate youths into the culture of enterprise.







Student booths on the other hand, presented business programmes and activities that have been run by their respective entrepreneurial student clubs and co-curricular activities. There were also those who tried their hand at setting up and running their own shops selling soft toys and bookmarks among others. Most importantly are exhibits which showcased exemplary Singapore start-ups such as Charles and Keith detailing their humble beginnings to the successful businesses they are today.







Also gracing the event were educational albeit fun filled games held by Settlers Lite, also a local start up. Set in tables laid with board games, groups of students were treated to the fine but essential skills of networking and negotiating. Strategic game play was also evident in “Dividends” where players engage themselves in the trade of financial literacy. Central to the purpose of enterprise, these would prove to be invaluable skills in business and lay the foundation of enterprise in seamless and interactive activity.







Workshops were at hand to foster creative ideas and grease the wheels of innovation. In a series of talks, students participated in discussions with speakers, shared ideas and mapped out concepts in business. It presents a wonderful avenue for them to learn and interact with others to inspire potential entrepreneurs by planting the seeds of business acumen.

Join Us at BlueSky Enterprise Day 2008!

Register for the workshops now by sending your details to events@talentpreneurhub.com !

Hope to see you there! :)

Cream of the Crop

I personally think that the IvP is a great programme for young students to stand up and dare to be creative.

These students at Kong Hwa School are exceptionally intelligent, creative and initiative (and self-initiated learners if I may add). Don't judge them based on their sizes, for small people, they sure have big ideas.

The red dot design museum never cease to amaze. Especially if you're visiting it for the first time. Students want to email the designers to ask them some questions on their works.
'Grandma, what a big fridge you have...' 'The better to chop you up and refrigerate you my dear...' A student explores one of the award-winning design refrigerator.
Back to school : students share what they have learnt during the museum visit.

BrainWriting in action! 'So what do you think?' The Innovative 8 (one of them is missing from the picture) brainstorm for ideas.' So tell me again why these students are so passionate about innovation? They come up with great ideas, question everything and have a huge hunger to learn.'

'These are the better students, they're all student leaders and are good performers in school.'

Ah, this explains everything. All the best for your IvP project kids! I'll definitely be seeing you soon!

InnoWorks™ : Spark That Idea!

I think I forgot to announce this but Youth Enterprise Academy is the Education Partner of the 9th Design Competition organised by Bukit View Secondary School and Ngee Ann Polytechnic.



To help students to find that creative spark they need to create that winning design, a compact version of the programme was customised for the competition and students and teachers from schools like Rulang Primary School, Raffles Girls School (Secondary) and Pasir Ris Primary School came together for an afternoon of learning and fun!

'Hmm where does this piece go?'

Students learn about the importance of Innovation in today's world. It's presentation time! Feedback is always important. And I really like their ideas too!

The red dot design museum is a great place for new ideas to spawn forth from young minds!
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the teachers and students for attending the workshop.

It's not often that we have teachers and students to come together as participants and I'm glad they did, because I think that just the simple task of working together will help to them to bond as a team and I'm confident that they'll be able to do well in the upcoming competition!

National Schools Entrepreneur Summit 2007 Revisited

The National Schools Entrepreneur Summit (NSES) 2007, organised by Youth Enterprise Academy, SMU Ventures and Talentpreneur Hub, is an annual platform for primary to tertiary institutes to come together to share and showcase their various entrepreneurial initiatives and achievements. It was held on Sat, October 27th 2007 at Singapore Management University and attracted more than 250 representatives from 45 schools.

Students and teachers from 19 schools and institutes were invited to take part in the Young Entrepreneur Showcase and was a great way for participants to be updated with the latest in the school I&E scene. Student participants received the opportunity to learn and interact with their peers from other schools as well as with young entrepreneurs who have started their business.

Summit participants also got to engage a panel of educators and entrepreneurs on relevant issues in the youth entrepreneurship scene. Individuals on the Panel included Mr Tony Seow, Guest of Honor and Founder & Managing Director of Purple Sage; Professor Desai, Associate Dean of Information Systems; Mr Suresh Shankar, CEO of RedPill Solution; Mr Ken Koh, Founder & Business Development Director, Youth Enterprise Academy.

Here are some snapshots from the event:

2 Sheeps for 1 Brick Please!

I had a pleasant surprise during one of my board games session for Kong Hwa School that was held at Settler's Cafe.

One of the creator of the stock market board game Dividends (pictured above), Evelyn Brunner from Fun Factory Games, actually dropped by to check out our board game programme!


Colin invited her, and even he initially thought that Kong Hwa School was a secondary school and told Evelyn, 'You got to come see these people use your board game to teach entrepreneurship to secondary school students.'

So they both were shell shocked when I told them that these kids are actually primary school students and yes, they ARE playing high-level games like Settlers of Catan and Dividends, and they play it well too. And no, you're not dreaming either.

Evelyn told me that Dividends was never really intended for children 12 years of age and below. That's because the stock market system and its concepts aren't easily understandable by the very young.

Remind me to drop her an email the next time saying that she can drop the target age group on the box from 13+ - Adults to 10+ - Adults.

I'm not surprised at how smart and creative primary school students are simply because I've work with them a lot. I get this warm proud feeling in my heart when I see them play Settlers of Catan and they trade and negotiate as well as anyone you can think of.

Bullying techniques? Check.

Reverse-psychology techniques? Check.

Long-term partnerships? Check.

Good head for business? (You want this ore? Sure, pass me 2 sheep and 1 wood and it's yours) Check.

So really, underestimate them at your own peril. Competitions like YESCOM have already proved that when it comes to Innovation and Entrepreneurship, the primary school students are as business-savvy (if not more so) as secondary school students.

And They All Wear Pink Bags!

I just couldn't find a picture of the schools bags, I asked the girls in my class, 'Why is it that everyone's bags are pink? You see Barbie, Cars, Shrek, and they're all in pink!'

Their reply was just, 'Because we are girls what!' My apologies then, I stand rebuked.

The Primary 5 cohort of CHIJ Lady of the Nativity went through the InnoWorks™ at red dot museum programme to generate and think of new and fun ways to teach maths.

I haven't gone back to the school to take a look at their end products yet, I can't wait for it.

The class that I took was 5 Hope, supposedly the smartest class in the cohort and well, it showed. Despite being obvious smart alecks, they came up with really innovative ways to teach math.

The girls were real darlings (maybe because it was only 2 days, instead of 200 days as a teacher), and again, the visit to red dot design museum proved successful and was really good in expanding mindsets and revisiting mental boundaries.

I remember seeing a team of the girls entering the Bukit View Design Competition (because I snucked a peek at the Bukit View Design Competition entries, but that's another post for another time) but I couldn't be sure, but all the best Team Nativity! We're rooting for ya!

The Zealots

This isn't the first time we've worked with St Stephen's School, but when Dean and I went down last week to do a little sharing on entrepreneurship during assembly, I must say that the boys were REALLY enthusiastic.

Especially if there were prizes at stakes. Which is a GOOD thing. Maximum participation if I may add. I had a really hard time deciding which hand shot up first everytime Dean asks a question.

The first step to being an entrepreneur is to be proactive, no entrepreneur made his fortune by just waiting for things to happen. It could be that they're young, but looking at these kids, if they keep stepping up like that, they'll be the future landscape-shapers. You'll see.

Also, another point to add, it may not be obvious here. But notice how ALL their school bags are blue?

So does that mean that for an all-girls school, you'll see a lot of pink bags?

The Smaller, The Better

If you thnk that younger children can never be entrepreneurial, you've obviously NOT met the boys of St Stephen's School.

They're smart, speak impeccable english, have a great vocabulary, and comes up with the most interesting bazaar and product ideas EVER.

I mean, honestly, who would have thought of using Crocs sandals in a game, or mini-golf to raise fun?

Youth Enterprise Academy was engaged to train the students and to teach them the finer points of entrepreneurship. We taught them how to sell, market and promote their products.

I'll be the first one to tell you that I honestly didn't think that red packets stuffed full of surprise candy and chocolate would sell during the bazaar but they were the first one to sell out! Other great ideas that came up were ang bao cranes, bookmarks and other small gifts made from low cost items. I figured it's probably the Kinder Surprise mentality but it probably means that these kids know their target customers more than I do.

But just coming up with good products isn't good enough. You have to back it up with great marketing and promotion. The boys from Soldiers of Fortune created a pretty good and effective example:

At the end of the day, it was a really good practice for the boys, to learn from their mistakes that they made during the bazaar. I hear that they're going to have another bazaar in the later half of the year so all the best boys!