Dragons' Den Project with Mile Cross Primary School
In the Lent term of Norwich School Partnerships and Business Enterprise departments welcomed the return of Mile Cross Primary School’s Year 6 for the Dragons’ Den project. Now in its third year, the project is a Dragons’ Den style challenge for the young pupils to work in teams to develop a business idea, helped by Norwich School Lower 6 Business Enterprise pupils acting as mentors.
Aims
The groups worked with their mentors in a series of workshops at Norwich School, run by our Business Enterprise team, where they were tasked with coming up with their business ideas.
The finale took place at Norwich School this week, where the teams pitched to our real-life Dragons: the Chief Operating Officer of Norfolk Chamber of Commerce and the Community Affairs Advisor at Jarrolds and the current Sheriff of Norwich, along with Norwich School’s resident business expert. The pupils’ ideas ranged from jewellery which disguised a safety alarm to alert police if the wearer feels unsafe, some washable football boots to make muddy boots a thing of the past and customiseable keyrings.
The winning group, named “Electro-Abs” designed a bike which can be used indoors and outdoors with the ability to power the user’s home appliances when the bike is ridden. The group gave a very professional pitch and gained extra points for pledging to give a proportion of profits to charity.
Background
Norwich School has been working with Mile Cross Primary since 2018 when we held the first Dragons' Den challenge. The partnership was formed through the Norwich Opportunity Area, a board set up to increase attainment and aspirations in Norwich's most disadvantaged areas. As a board member, Norwich School was connected with Mile Cross Primary School whose pupils have been identified as being in the bottom 2% for deprived in the country.
The aim of the project was to introduce the young pupils to the idea of Business Enterprise and how businesses work whilst also providing an opportunity for our own 6th Form pupils to take on the role of mentors and teachers.
Impact
Commenting on the finale, Head of Policy, Governance & Public Affairs, Norfolk Chamber of Commerce said:
“The students pitching in the Dragon’s Den have done an amazing job. Their presentations were well thought out and they had clearly done lots of work and research before presenting enthusiastic and interesting pitches. The Dragons had a truly difficult decision to select the winning bid and congratulations to ‘We Are Electro-Abs’ on their winning pitch. The talent and energy in the room was brilliant and I think we may have seen several future entrepreneurs! Well done to all the teams.”
Fellow Dragon, Ms Jarrold said:
“It was so impressive to see the pitches from the students and the creativity of their ideas. It must have been quite a daunting situation for them and they did incredibly well in presenting their proposals and business plans. It is heartening to see a collaboration of this nature between the two schools and all of the pupils should be very proud of their achievements. I felt that we saw some really good signs of enterprise and imagination and hope that the students will look back on a day which gave them a great opportunity to work together, develop ideas and skills and build their confidence for the future.”
The Norwich School Business Enterprise pupils who took part were equally impressed with their mentee’s enthusiasm:
“The pupils listened really well and were very fun to work with, they had an endless stream of good ideas!”
“I really enjoyed the experience of teaching Business and listening to their creative ideas.”
Pupil Involvement
The project involved 70 Year 5 Pupils from Mile Cross Primary and 20 L6 pupils from Norwich School.
Frequency
We are looking forward to next year’s Dragons’ Den already!
