Young entrepreneurs reach regional final

Emma Knights

Bright young entrepreneurs from a Dereham school have been taking part in the regional final of a national competition.

The i-Lympics team from Northgate High School were one of 20 teams from schools across the East of England to compete in the Make Your Mark Challenge 2008 at Ipswich Town Football Club on November 28.

Each team of youngsters aged between 14 and 16 had to impress a panel of judges with an entrepreneurial idea inspired by the Olympic and Paralympic values.

The i-Lympics team included Josh Fawkes, Albert Van Dyke, Charlotte Ward, Sophie Cordell and Asia Lambert.

The team's business idea was to create a social networking site with a translating capability that enabled people to discuss sport across the world.

Once the networking site was up and running the team also wanted to set up i-Lympics internet cafés in major cities across the UK.

Asia said: “It was really exciting taking part in the final. It was a totally new experience for us to present our ideas in front of people that we did not know.”

Four other Norfolk teams took part in the challenge. They were Notre Dame High, in Norwich, St Clements High School, in Terrington St Clement, Caister High School and Flegg High School.

A team from St Peter's School, in Huntingdon, eventually won.

Make Your Mark Challenge East of England was co-ordinated by The Exchange (Norfolk Education Business Partnership) which exists to help schools and businesses work together.

Tom O'Connor, chief executive of The Exchange, said: “The teams in our regional final developed stunning, colourful, flexible and achievable ideas. We had an inspirational day.”

More than 55,000 students in 1,000 organisations throughout the UK took part in the Make Your Mark Challenge. 120 schools took part in the East of England.