By Mark Vink
IB DP Business Management & Economics Teacher
Learn to Start Instructor
As the school year draws to a close, the Startup Studio Networking Night held at Northbridge International School Cambodia here in Phnom Penh saw the culmination of our Grade 9 students' journey on the Learn to Start program, designed to equip them with the necessary skills to be productive and competitive in unpredictable markets. Put simply: be market-ready.
Students who are market-ready are able to respond to ever-changing markets, understand that learning is for life and outcomes are based on a person’s ability to change, to think critically, and to solve problems. There is a clear difference between being job or career-ready and being market-ready.
Job or career-readiness is narrow and inflexible because it is specific to the job or career students believe they want to pursue. Market-readiness is broad and flexible, allowing students to pivot as markets change and new opportunities arise for them.
Over the year, students have worked individually or in teams to explore startup business opportunities in their chosen industry or engage in community-based projects aimed at providing social benefit. Having developed expertise in their chosen industry through research and mentorship, students then sought to develop solutions in response to market needs identified, adapting and refining their value propositions as they deepened their awareness of industry trends and behaviour of target market participants.
The Networking Night offered our students the opportunity to showcase their projects to parents, faculty and members of the Phnom Penh business community. It was inspiring to see the ease and confidence with which our students engaged with guests, with several teams stepping up to the challenge of pitching at the event.
We look forward to seeing next year’s Grade 9 start their entrepreneurial journey in the Startup Studio!
World Children's Day (WCD) is celebrated on November 20 each year to promote international togetherness, awareness among children worldwide, and improving children's welfare.
The readers of this article have all likely experienced a ‘traditional’ exam setting. Rows of desks, pen and paper, and exam papers that are primarily constructed to test knowledge and recall of the course content. There is certainly some value to an exam paper that assesses a student’s knowledge, but ultimately, knowledge and recall represents a very narrow range of the skills actually needed in the modern world. Recognising this, the IB has taken an revolutionary look at assessment in the middle years, with the eAssessment.
