Foundation students unleash entrepreneurial spirit
Sweet Treats members showing off their pastries, which were a part of their Social Studies entrepreneurial project.
‘Nature Fruit’ members provided a wide selection of fresh juices.
Second year students at Christ Church Foundation School were challenged to channel their creativity by developing businesses as part of a Social Studies project.
The five-week-long initiative saw the students form groups, conceptualise their own business, create an organisational structure and market it.
Recently, those businesses were revealed to the school. Social Studies teacher, Annette Maynard-Watson, said the exercise was part of the subject’s Caribbean Certificate of Secondary Level Competence (CCSLC) project.
“The focus was on entrepreneurship, so I decided to take it a step further by giving them hands-on experience. I wanted them to explore – to see how it feels to conceptualise their own business; appoint management, accountant, etc.; and then market it… Get the full feel of how it is to be an entrepreneur,” she told The Barbados Advocate.
While acknowledging that all students focused on pastry and beverage businesses, Maynard-Watson however expressed that she was still extremely proud of their efforts.
“This is the second year for such a project and last year’s students embraced other areas such as make-up and they made Independence badges.
“However, I am not disappointed that these students all chose pastries and beverages because it seems to be what they are comfortable with. They all embraced the project and you can see they are decked out in their branded shirts, badges and they have their business cards and flyers.
“What is also commendable is that their parents got involved. The parents said that because of the excitement their children displayed at home preparing for
the project, they decided to get on board,” she said.
Tiffany Webster, Co-Manager of the group “Sweet Treats” described the project as “very exciting.”
“In Social Studies, the topic was ‘The World of Work’, so we are learning how to run our own business, and it’s something I want to do eventually.
“It was an experience for me. At first, we were like, ‘how are we going to tackle this?’ We calmed down and each member was asked what they made at home for fun and then each person decided on what they would contribute. We have cookie pops, cupcakes, blueberry muffins, cheese cake and a wide variety of natural juices – everything we offer is home-made,” she pointed out. (TL)
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