Entrepreneurialism

“To succeed in this ever-changing world, students need to be able to think like entrepreneurs: resourceful, flexible, creative, and global” (Professor Yong Zhao, University of Kansas).

When young people leave school, they will be facing a complex, dynamic and uncertain world that will require them to be resilient, courageous, and agentic. According to the World Economic Forum (2021), half of today's work activities could be automated by 2055, posing even more challenges for their future work choices. What is needed in schools is a focus on supporting our students to develop an entrepreneurial mindset and the crucial enterprise and life skills of creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, communication, citizenship, and collaboration.

The Hills Grammar School was founded by people who personified entrepreneurialism. They had the vision, the imagination, and the skills to courageously create a new school. This is what makes Hills unique. Thus, it is imperative that we honour their enterprise thinking. According to the Foundation for Young Australians (2020), enterprise skills are needed for young people to thrive in an uncertain future. This entrepreneurial spirit, combined with a solid academic foundation, is essential for continued individual success and prosperity in a competitive and democratic society. Students become more motivated and begin to realise how what they have learned in academic subjects is transferable to the world of work.

Introducing young people to entrepreneurship helps them to be more creative, collaborative, and confident, and to think and act ethically, morally, and responsibly. Year 5 students participated in two entrepreneurial projects this year: Market Day and the SEAT project. Both projects required the students to work in teams, to be creative and innovative and to adopt a social enterprise, ethical approach to their projects. The SEAT project involved designing a small seat that included communicating to parents the story behind the designs they created and the auctioning the finished products to raise funds for the Orange Laundry charity. Market Day required students in teams to design a product and promote its sale with all profits also going to the Orange Laundry.

Our Year 9 students are participating in a year-long entrepreneurship program where they are learning about ethical entrepreneurial mindsets and the gig economy. The students are mentored by teachers, business leaders, and alums. They work in small teams to create an innovative start-up company and will pitch their idea to a Shark Tank. The students are supported to understand the need for innovation and blue-sky thinking, the importance of conducting market research and pursuing their passions and interests and learning how to cope with unexpected problems and challenges. They must meet deadlines, work collaboratively as a team, and find authentic solutions. One group of students has since evolved their 2021 idea beyond theory and created a new business ‘Crisp Salads’ that caters regularly for school functions.

The Early Childhood Centre children commenced their entrepreneurial journey by cultivating sustainable gardens and growing their own plants. The elected Children’s Council has already presented new market ideas to the principal.

Focusing on entrepreneurialism at Hills has many educational benefits, such as:

• Helping prepare students for an uncertain and dynamic future where the skills of creativity, critical thinking, character, collaboration, communication, and citizenship are already considered essential by the OECD (2022) and Deloitte (2021).
• Enabling students to understand the importance of being an agile analytical person who continues to strive with hope and pragmatic optimism to find solutions to real world problems rather than giving up or accepting mediocrity. The younger you introduce students to entrepreneurial thinking, the earlier they will learn to adopt a hopeful outlook that empowers them to take informed risks and see opportunities in setbacks.
• Fostering what Professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, Angela Duckworth, refers to as grit and perseverance.
• Encouraging young people to realise the value of a social enterprise mindset where it is about giving back, contributing to society, and acting ethically and morally. We want our students to enter the world as agentic, compassionate, and empathetic global citizens who are prepared and ready to grapple with the challenges of the future and dare to make a difference.
• Enabling young people to have the confidence and courage to be leaders. Taking charge or collaborating on an entrepreneurial project means that young people must take the lead and make challenging decisions.

The entrepreneurship programs at Hills add to the depth of learning across the School and complement innovative programs such as the Year 5 Mars Colony (Citizenship), Year 6 Expo (Critical Thinking), Year 7 STEM program (Collaboration) and the Year 8 Game Changers (Creativity). These programs work in conjunction with the School’s rigorous co-curricular, wellbeing and academic curriculum in nurturing and future-proofing the Hills “Originals” for life beyond the school gates.

We are already looking to the future with the development of a new Stage 3 enrichment program based on entrepreneurial mindsets in the process of being developed by our Head of Junior School Sarah Black and Assistant Head Jason Milner. Our Genesis Centre with its focus on innovation and skills building in areas such as robotics and multimedia and the newly proposed transformation of the Booth Centre that will invite community, industry and university partnerships and support student start-ups, will inspire our students, and provide places where innovative ideas and blue-sky thinking can thrive.

School-based enterprise education has a valuable role to play in creating the next generation of entrepreneurs. Thomas Edison stated that "The greatest invention in the world is the mind of a child." We need to encourage our students to be creative, critical thinking problem solvers who have the mindset and the ability to make a meaningful difference to their future and the world, and value what it means to be an “Original”.

Karen Yager | Principal