Somerset College Celebration of Entrepreneurship - 2018

Somerset College hosted its second Somerset Celebration of Entrepreneurship this week. The Festival was another fantastic success, with ticket sales increasing from 5000 in 2017 to nearly 8000 this year.

Key speakers included Steve Baxter from Shark Tank, and Yasmin Grigaliunas Co-Founder of the World’s Biggest Garage Sale. However, the highlight of the Festival was again Lucas and Nicholas from Orange Sky, who inspired over 750 students from across the Gold Coast with their passion for providing homeless Australians with the opportunity to wash their clothes and have a shower in a safe and secure environment.

Lisa Brincat, Somerset Alumni and Organiser of the Futurist Collective had this to say about the Festival:

"Yesterday I hosted a workshop with 60 year 4 students (9 year olds). We discussed some of the problems facing the world. According to the students, pollution is the world’s biggest problem. We brainstormed solutions to this problem, talked about design thinking and then the kids pitched their solutions to the pollution problem to investors. Interestingly with no prompting the kids came up with all the same questions investors typically ask - what will you use the funds for, what’s the competition. If 9 year olds can nail investing then good news for all of us!"

Leigh Kelson from Beach City Media had this to say about two of our students, Tom McKenna and Isabella Strong who worked with Leigh’s team to provide live You Tube Coverage of the event:

“We had an awesome time and I also just wanted you to pass on my thanks to Issy and Tom. I couldn't find them before I left and didn't get a chance to thank them . They did an awesome job conducting interviews live streamed on You Tube!”

Michael Metcalf, Founder of Kynd had this to say about the Festival:

“Super awesome to spend today with students, parents, teachers and people today from all across the GoldCoast for the Somerset Celebration of Entrepreneurship! We were inspired by their questions and the interest these students show in creating a better world. A Year 5 girl just asked if we could help her parents because her sister is going through chemotherapy and they are ‘sad and stressed’. We must change how we access care. Excited to see this upcoming generation of little entrepreneurs being unleashed on the world.”

Throughout the Festival, there were also several competitions. The winners of these competitions are as follows:

Senior Years Bond University Pitch Competition:

• Sarah McTaggart
• Eva Wallace
• Ashleigh Shannon

These girls will now work with Blue Lens Group to start their School business using the $3000 seed capital kindly donated by the Somerset Alumni Association.

Somerset Alumni Middle Years Pitch Competition:

• Jaimee Dwyer
• Cawin Ashok Kumar
• Marcus Nguyen

These students will now work with members of the Somerset Alumni Association to start their business using the $2000 seed capital kindly donated by the Alumni Association.

An enormous thank you to the entire Somerset Community for their support of the Festival. We are looking forward to 2019 already!