Students from across ORT’s global network joined together in Italy for an entrepreneurship challenge with a difference this summer.

The group included youths from Spain and South Africa who won this year’s World ORT Taub Young Entrepreneurship Program.

Their prize was a place on the International Careers Challenge alongside peers from ORT UK and World ORT Kadima Mada in Israel.

In total 26 students travelled to Rome and Milan in July for a week of activities based around the ten entrepreneurial skills they learned during the year-long YEP program.

YEP is an opportunity for ORT students to live the experience of designing a product or service that solves a social problem, with milestone presentations and pitches to judges throughout the course.

The South African group was formed by students from the King David Schools in Johannesburg. They won the YEP southern hemisphere project earlier this year after creating a wellness tracking device for pets.

From Spain, the group came from Barcelona, from the Colegio Hatikva school. They had won the YEP northern hemisphere competition with an app designed to offer a supportive environment for users to explore and understand their feelings in real-time.

Students from a young ambassadors personal development program based at World ORT’s Kfar Silver Youth Village in Israel also joined the trip, as did 10 British students.

The aim of the Italy challenge was to help the students develop key employability skills such as collaboration, research, project management, entrepreneurship, time-management, creative thinking and pitching. These skills are not taught as part of the school curriculum, yet are increasingly important in the workplace, across a wide range of industries.

Guided by industry experts, the students worked in five mixed teams, drawing on their diverse backgrounds and perspectives to develop a scalable urban agriculture project. Their design had to increase and maintain fresh food supplies that could be integrated into a city, using innovative techniques and digital technology, promoting environmental sustainability and fostering community involvement.

Tevin, a YEP winner from South Africa, said: “We worked really hard for the first couple of days. We got split into different mixed national groups. We had to learn how to work in a team with other people who have other skills and different strengths and weaknesses.”

He said the skills developed during the wider YEP program had helped the team learn how to present, research data and information and better understand the pitching process.

 

Magali, a YEP winner from Spain, highlighted the experience in Italy as one of the best in her life: “We met people from all over the world and forged friendships that will last a lifetime. We also participated in the proposed challenge, where we learned about innovation, urbanism and agriculture.”

Participants drew inspiration from the history and culture in Rome and Milan, following trips to the Milan Innovation District, the Leonardo Da Vinci Museum, the Colosseum and Pantheon, plus Milan’s Shoah memorial, Rome’s Jewish quarter and the ORT Milan school.

The teams worked around the clock to design their projects which they presented to a judging panel at the end of the week.

Each student had the opportunity to grow, developing transferable working skills needed in the modern world of work and to build up their confidence for their future career.

The judges selected two winning teams:

Winner for Innovation – In Johannesburg there are major food shortages and malnutrition in poor communities leading to a healthy food crisis. Team Three opted for hydroponic container farming, which can be used to create a sustainable source of healthy food. It is fast, water efficient, space-saving and doesn’t require soil.

Winner for Social Action – In Alexandra there is poverty and rising crime. Team Four elected to train the population to grow fruits and vegetables to eat and sell, enabling self-sufficiency. They also planned to build a community garden to improve their sense of community.

Learn more about the last YEP Project Southern Hemisphere:

https://ort.org/en/news/pet-project-secures-yep-victory-for-south-africa-students/

Learn more about the last YEP Project Northern Hemisphere:

https://ort.org/en/news/spanish-team-wins-yep-prize-with-mental-health-support-app/