CENTRES

CENTRES (Creative Entrepreneurship in Schools) project has been funded with support from the European Commission.

This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

www.centres-eu.org

With the support of the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Union

“The Creative Wave” August-October 2013, Aarhus Denmark

1. Context The schools in this pilot are both very experienced in teaching entrepreneurship and they chose to run the project as a part of their annual innovation week. The schools have been working together with FFE-YE for a long time and it was the learning opportunities in the project more than the fact that the winning class would get a price of 1.500 DKK. 2. Approach The pilot activity is described in the original CENTRES application and was planned in cooperation with the network “Young Creative Entrepreneurs”. Unfortunately this network was closed due to lack of funding but we managed to get one of the key person from the network to participate in the pilot. The pilot was carried out as a competition for school classes and the objective was to design new green areas in the city. The classes could choose to divide into teams and send in thier new designs by mail. All contributions were read by judges and a winne was found. 3. Rationale As mentioned above the two schools are both experienced entrepreneur schools but have not worked with creative industries previously and this new area could proof to give the schools new views on entrepreneurship education.

4. Pilot Description This activity was organized as a competition for schools and the aim was to transform dull school tarmac surroundings into green areas where the kids wanted to stay even after school. In June 2013 schools in Aarhus were invited to the competition and two schools registered 7 classes with a total of 16 pupils and 7 teachers. The competition was kicked off by creative entrepreneur Nicolai Juhler who gave a 1 hour talk to the pupils about how you can change your local environment through creative thinking. After the speak the school worked on the project in the classroom and on deadline the 21st of October app 25 contributions were send from the two schools. The judges – Nicolai Juhler, Jacob Urup Nielsen from British Council and Peter Rasmussen, FFE-YE easily agreed on the winner. The price was 1.500 DKK and a trip to Danish Entrepreneurship Award 2013. The class presented their solutions to several people at Award show. The winning solution can be seen here: http://2005a.skoleblogs.dk/category/kreativ-bolge/

CENTRES (Creative Entrepreneurship in Schools) project has been funded with support from the European Commission.

This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

www.centres-eu.org

With the support of the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Union

170 pupils, 10 teachers, two schools and one mentor participated in this pilot. 5. Impact & Legacy Apart from the evaluation sheets this pilot also provided a good understanding of the impact though the 25 papers submitted by the pupils. The nature of the competition forced the pupils to think in other directions and they were also expected to take issues like sustainability, environment, economics and promotion in to consideration in their solutions. The papers clearly showed that a majority of the pupils had reflected on the creative part but not so much on some of the other issues. So it is obvious to conclude that the pupils are good when it come to creating new ideas and innovative solutions but when it comes to connecting these to more tedious stuff like money, business and promotion they lack insight. The mentor finds that the pupils have developed through the project and it was clear to see that they were good at working together but need to enhance the innovative dimension of their solutions. He suggests that teachers should have more training in innovative teaching but underlines that he benefitted himself from the project and now has a better understanding of how to inspire young people. 6. Quality Originally the pilot was designed to deliver the following output:

Guidelines on “How do schools get in contact with private creative business” and “What can

my creative business benefit from engaging with schools?”

Network of mentors for future schools projects on entrepreneurship

Examples on how entrepreneurship and innovation can fit into the curriculum.

Due to the closing of the network - “Creative Entreprenuers” it was not possible to create a network of mentors from the creative industries, but this pilot (along with the two others) has risen an interest from both schools and industries to develop future projects. CENTRES has demonstrated that it is not only interesting for schools to work with the traditional industry when it comes to entrepreneurial projects. The infamous conflict in Denmark between teachers and school authorities in April and May 2013 also meant that a redesign of the original pilot was necessary and the guide line for both schools and business will still be produced both probably in a somewhat reduced form and not until all three pilots are finished. The output could be an article on the CENTERS website. Examples of entrepreneurship in the curriculum will be extracted from the three pilots and be presented on the website.

CENTRES (Creative Entrepreneurship in Schools) project has been funded with support from the European Commission.

This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

www.centres-eu.org

With the support of the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Union

Generally spoken we could have liaised with more mentors but the schedule didn’t allow it. All in all the quality of the Danish Pilots were higher than we could have hoped for because the three pilots gave a bigger diversity and more angels to the project. The quality of the pupils’ work was generally high and showed a good understanding of the issues.

7. Insight The pilot in Aarhus was designed as a competition and that requires someone to organise it, but it could easily work in any class room and we have already been asked if we will repeat it next school year. There are always things to consider when you use a competition in a didactic context. The invitation to the schools will be on the web site. The local and environmental focus in the competition was a determining factor for the quality and the transferability. The pupils could easily relate to the issues because they were based in a realistic context.