SHS partners with Founders4Schools
News article from June 6, 2019
We are very pleased to announce our new partnership with Founders4Schools – an organisation which connects business leaders with local schools to increase social mobility. As ambassadors for student employability, Founders4Schools and School-Home Support will facilitate student-employer encounters by enabling teachers to place business leaders in their classrooms. These leaders will talk to students about the jobs they might hold or create in the future.
About Founders4Schools
Born in 2011, Founders4Schools began as an extension of ‘Silicon Valley Comes to the UK’ as a manually curated idea to bring inspiring entrepreneurs to universities and schools. The feedback from parents, educators and students was so powerful, they decided to think about how we could use technology common in other industries to the education industry. So by 2013, spurred on by encouragement from Government, industry and the educational sector, Founders4Schools collaborated with LinkedIn, EduBase, and DueDil to create a tech platform that supercharged educators to create student-employer encounters as easily as buying a book on Amazon. The search for business leaders through our platform is a huge time saver compared to emails and phone calls to set up role models and includes that speakers are willing to travel at their own expense.
Founders4Schools’ mission is to inspire students and prepare them for the rapidly changing world of work.
Founders4Schools does this by enabling educators to invite business leaders to encounters with their students in just 4 minutes. Their online platform is a FREE service, connecting educators with leaders of successful growing businesses in their community.
Educators – why use the Founders4Schools platform?
Inspire your students by connecting them with local business leaders from fast-growing companies.
Choose from a wide range of free career programmes based on Gatsby Foundations Benchmarks on Good Careers Guidance.
96% of students felt inspired following their Founders4Schools encounter.
Get going and set up your first FREE event with Founders4Schools and SHS today.
Employers – sign up to visit local schools!
Meet local students and help to improve youth employability in your area
Receive guidance and resources to help you prepare and provide a meaningful experience
Build your future talent pipeline to scale your business
Inspire young people today, and help to change their future – follow this link to volunteer now!
The Virtue of Volunteering
Rosalind Stuart, Director of Partnerships UK at Founders4Schools, has written an interesting piece on the benefits of volunteering:
I have been working for Founders4Schools since August 2017, initially as a volunteer, then as a Community Engagement lead in Scotland, and now as the Director of Partnerships. I am extremely proud to work for Founders4Schools. Our mission is to inspire students and prepare them for the rapidly changing world of work. We do this by enabling educators to invite business leaders to encounters with their students in just 4 minutes. Our online platform is a free service, connecting educators with leaders of successful growing businesses in their community. Do please explore our website to find out more.
There are two key reasons why I feel that what we do crucially important within the TechForGood movement, and more specifically within EdTech. The first reason is easy to explain, we are providing a tangible methodology by which educators and business leaders are able to easily connect, helping our young people to learn more about the World of Work. The second reason is less obvious but, in my view, just as important and that’s to do with the virtue of volunteering.
Our volunteers have supported over 282,000 young people up and down the UK over the last few years, from Aberdeen to Abingdon, Stirling to Stafford. They’ve given almost 14,000 hours of their time to improve the life chances of young people in their community. We don’t offer expenses of any kind and all of our volunteers are very busy people fitting this in around their working lives. So, why are they doing it? To improve their talent pipeline? Yes. As part of a CSR initiative within their company? Sometimes. As a professional development opportunity to improve their communication skills? Yes, that too. But, in the vast majority of cases, they are doing it because volunteering their time makes them feel happy and fulfilled. It roots them back into the purpose of their own working lives, reminds them of the wider impact of their own vocations and indeed what they ‘wish they had been told’ when they were the ones sitting on the plastic moulded chairs dreaming of their future.
To veer off into normative ethics for a moment it’s a motivation rooted in the ideas of Aristotelian Virtue Ethics. Virtue ethics is person rather than action based: it looks at the virtue or moral character of the person carrying out an action, rather than at ethical duties and rules, or the consequences of particular actions. The rules and restrictions of ‘what is right’ to one side for a moment Aristotle argues that when people behave ‘virtuously’ they feel better about themselves, indeed they experience Eudaemonia; flourishing. I think we should talk about this aspect of volunteering much more. Happiness is not a simple thing and finding something so connected to our working In my view, it’s this intangible little gem which motivates the fantastic people who give of their time through Founders4Schools. Here’s what some of our volunteers thought of their experiences.
Dana Denis-Smith CEO Obelisk Support; FounderFirst 100 Years; TEDx speaker; Legal Personality of the Year 2018-19. “Thanks, Founders4School for the opportunity to speak girls at St Albans Girls school. Amazing to see 100 girls so curious and smart and confident about their career. Must keep them believing the world of work will welcome them on an equal footing to men”
Cat Burton, Fine Art Photographer, Photography Workshop Leader and Business Advisor. “So I just did my first presentation at a Primary School (volunteering with Founders4School) & I was genuinely blown away by the reception from the students (50 children around 11yo). They asked more questions than at ANY presentation I’ve given to adults, I’ve had an amazing time inspiring these kids today, who seem super excited at the prospect of creative careers. Thanks to Founders4Schools for the opportunity, and if anyone else wants to help inspire school kids, contact them. It’s a really rewarding thing to do.”
Simon Hunt, Director of Finance and Corporate Affairs at Scottish Autism “Thank you to P6 for making me feel welcome and enthusiastically answering all of my questions!”
I believe that volunteering has a particularly special power to change not just the lives of those who benefit directly from it, but also those who deliver it; give it a go.
