Year 9 students work with visitors from the world of business in Property Challenge

Our recent Skills Day on Friday 5th June saw Year 9 students participating in an enterprise activity called the Property Challenge. The day was jointly organised with Education Business Group, Dartmouth Academy, South West Science and Technology Ambassadors and Cavanna Homes. Students worked in teams to design and develop a sustainable housing estate with 20 houses maximising the land and hopefully making a profit for their teams. The day was led by Martin Cavanna of Cavanna Homes who introduced the challenge and explained the finer details of property development. Students then completed their designs with each team member having a specific role with associated tasks to complete. The challenge involved letter writing, planning and designing a development, financial projections and artwork for the advertising materials. The best teams found that communication and teamwork were the key to success which Mr Cavanna explained all businesses need to succeed. Year 9 student Adam said, "the day has improved my teamwork and maths skills and has given me a taste of what it is like to work for a company." Another student Kieron said, "my team was fairly OK but we had a few disagreements along the way. They were sorted out on the end though." All the students had to present their roles and tasks to the rest of the year group. Most found this daunting but they all managed to speak in front of the gathered audience. The winning team from all the classes was H4H which included Ellie Heathcote, Lucy Branton, Soloman Polak and Lucy Bailey. The team had thought through their plans and presented their work clearly to the judges, confidently answering any questions that arose. H4H will now go through to the regional finals to compete against other schools who have also completed the challenge. Well done to everyone.