Students are best in business

More than 100 youngsters from across North Kirklees took part in the cross-school Innov8 challenge at Kirklees College.

The competition aimed to find the most innovative pupils and challenged youngsters to come up with original ideas.

A group of pupils from Westborough High School, in Dewsbury, were the overall winners of the event.

College business enterprise manager Lydia Butterworth said: “The aim of the competition was to encourage teams of enthusiastic young entrepreneurs to work cohesively with each other in taking on a variety of challenges, themed around enterprise and innovation.

“The submissions produced were of such a high standard – I was so impressed by the amount of entrepreneurial talent in the room, my sincerest congratulations to the winners - Westborough.”

The winning group included Shofaq Amin, Muhammad Yunis, Lohash Lubsir Latif and Junaid Patel. The competition’s runners up were pupils Kelsey Bates, Maleehah Ali, Erin Armour, Harry Walker and Dionne Clayton from St John Fisher in Dewsbury.

Third place were pupils Kacper Lubisz, Jacob shires, Luke Chappell, George Starkie and Callum Asquith, also from St John Fisher. The event was run by staff from the college’s Peter Jones Enterprise Academy. The academy, which is run by the Peter Jones Foundation charity, headed by the Dragons’ Den star Peter Jones CBE, offers courses in entrepreneurship at Kirklees College. Enterprise Lecturer Amir Hafidh said: “Feedback from the young entrepreneurs was very positive.

“The participants clearly enjoyed the dynamic nature of the competition and as such are looking into the possibility of coming to the academy as a way of enhancing their entrepreneurial spirit.”

Other schools involved in the event included Mirfield Free Grammar, Castle Hall Academy, Batley Grammar School, Batley Business and Enterprise College and Spen Valley High School. The Innov8 challenge was organised as a taster session - organised by the college’s student recruitment team - to give prospective students the chance to try out courses.

For more information the college visit www.kirkleescollege.ac.uk or call 01484 437070.