Essay competition aims to develop entrepreneurial spirit among teenagers

An inaugural Entrepreneurship Essay Competition for Sixth Form students in the UK has been launched by the Entrepreneurship Lab (E-Lab) at King’s College, University of Cambridge, which was founded by 2 faculty members at Cambridge Judge Business School.

The E-Lab founders are Kamiar Mohaddes, Associate Professor in Economics & Policy, and Thomas Roulet, Associate Professor in Organisation Theory.

Judging panel: a Dragon, a former Bank of England governor and an FT columnist

A winner and 2 runners-up will be selected by an expert panel of judges which includes:

• Deborah Meaden (Business Leader and Dragon from TV’s Dragons’ Den)
• Lord Mervyn King (former Governor of the Bank of England)
• Gillian Tett (Columnist and Editor-at-Large of the Financial Times, who will be the next Provost of King’s College)

The organisers, who include Cambridge Judge Business School PhD student Rhys Williams, hope the competition will nurture the entrepreneurial mindset in students who may not typically engage in the world of business and help them understand better how to launch an enterprise.

Students are asked to choose between one of 3 essays questions, which concern the ethics of a business having excess profits from selling ethical goods, learning from failure, and the impact of generative artificial intelligence for entrepreneurs.

Prize-giving ceremony to be held at King’s College, Cambridge

The winners will be invited to a prize-giving ceremony to be held at King’s College in late 2023. The winner receives a £1,000 cash prize to be split equally between the candidate and their school, and 2 runners-up prizes of £500 are also shared equally between the candidate and their school. The school portion of the prizes will be issued in the form of book tokens.