I was delighted to have the opportunity on Wednesday of this week to attend and present awards at the Junior Entrepreneur Awards in Co. Meath. Over 600 children from 16 Kildare Schools took part.
It was very impressive to see the strengths in schoolchildren to be our entrepreneurs of the future.
The Junior Entrepreneur Programme (JEP) was created to allow every primary school pupil in Ireland the opportunity to embrace entrepreneurship as part of their formative education. Children use their creativity to come up with a business idea and then work to turn this idea into reality over a 10 week period. Every pupil gets a chance to uncover their own strengths and play a key role in one of five distinct teams – Finance, Marketing, Design and Production, Sales and Storytelling.
Liam Queally as a local entrepreneur and MD of Irish Dog Foods, has sponsored the ‘Junior Entrepreneur Programme’ in primary schools in the Kildare area during the school year. Successful entrepreneurs throughout Ireland champion the rollout of the programme in their counties, by becoming JEP County Partners. With the support of the County Partner, Jep is delivered without any cost to parents or schools in participating counties.