So, why has Enterprise Week got all grown up and gone global? Not sure, but it makes sense to me. Our lives are increasingly influenced by global phenomenon. ‘Think global, act local’ is crystallised around the interdependency of our economies, our environment, and the power of global communication. The pace of change, global interconnectivity and the global challenges we face create a unique time.

This unique time needs enterprising people! Positive, ‘can do’ people with a growth mind-set: creative thinkers who find solutions and think and act quickly. It is vital that our young people learn to be enterprising – to see, create, develop and make the most of opportunities and rise to the challenge of change.

I see striking examples of young people’s enterprise all the time, and Global Entrepreneurship Week is a fantastic showcase of talent and potential.

Our LEO Enterprise Oscars was a glittering occasion involving 12 schools; a fantastic celebration of young peoples’ enterprise and hard work over the past six months. Young people, parents, school staff and “the great and the good” came together to celebrate great ideas, talent and achievement. The excitement and energy in the room was palpable and the films of student’s work testament to how enterprising young people can be given the opportunity and the guidance.

But that’s just some young people in some places!

What is our challenge as educators?

Our challenge is to ensure all young people get the opportunity to develop their enterprise capability to help them secure their future personal, social and economic well-being. If young people leave school lacking enterprise capability, we have failed to prepare them effectively for the world they’re going into.

How can we do this?

Now that’s too big a question to answer in one article, but in summary it means:

-       recognising the interconnectivity between the individual and the wider world. Just as we recognise the economic and environmental global interconnectivity, we need to join the dots more effectively between individuals and their immediate and wider community;

-       replacing the tunnel vision of immediate tasks, demands and curriculum content with more of a helicopter view that joins the dots between the different aspects of an individual’s world;

-       recognising, valuing and systematically developing the capabilities an individual needs to achieve personally, socially and economically;

-       making the curriculum more relevant and focused on developing capabilities and competencies rather than just being content-focused.

This doesn’t mean ditching everything we do, but rather doing things differently – facilitating learning more than teaching – teaching English in a way that also develops enterprise capability. As the song says; “It ain’t what you do, it’s the way that you do it!”

Teaching in an enterprising way is also good quality teaching!

The planning and reality of a real social enterprise project at Djanogly City Academy, Nottingham.

(find out more in our enterprise section)