What We Do
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Program Design
Our experienced team works within your school’s strategy to design world-class student entrepreneurship programs and support services that are unique to your school community.
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Workshops & Content
We work with your staff to facilitate workshops and/or create online learning content to benefit more of your student population in an equitable way. We can also bring in our network of exemplary guest speakers.
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Community Platform (2023)
We are launching a network of school-specific entrepreneur community websites, united by the overarching Young Wisdom community platform. If your school could be a launch partner, we would love to arrange a demo.
We like other providers, but we’re not like them
Unlike the many emerging extra-curricular entrepreneurship providers, we exist to help you create your own self-sustaining entrepreneurship program and community. By involving your students, parents, alumni and staff in the running of your program, we create experiential learning opportunities and pathways both unique to your school and built for longevity.
What We Believe
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Entrepreneurship is not for everyone
However, all students can develop crucial soft skills and entrepreneurial confidence by studying the process, frameworks and case studies - not to mention hearing stories firsthand from real founders and ecosystem participants!
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It shouldn't be glamourised
Students should not drop out or defer uni for a startup idea. They will likely pay a high opportunity cost for pursuing an ill-conceived idea at this stage of their lives. Feedback should always be delivered respectfully but never sugarcoated.
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We can reduce the opportunity cost
By providing serious, ongoing startup support services and infrastructure, schools can greatly increase students’ chances of succeeding or repurposing the whole experience into prized career opportunities and uni admissions.
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It's not just about technology
Most small business owners are not tech startups, but likely use technology with varying levels of effectiveness. Let’s help all students leverage emerging technologies better without developing a bias for web or mobile app-based ideas.
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Bring parts of the curriculum to life
Imagine business or legal studies classes where the case studies being looked at or set as assignments are real startups from your own student or alumni community, and those founders are ready and willing to help with content or talks.
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Embed social impact and ethics
Startups are sometimes associated with poor practices, including cutting corners and flouting laws. Sustainability and ethics are core considerations to us, including measuring success in terms of People, Planet and Profit.
Entrepreneurship demands a crucial mix of futureproof skills
As much as we are excited about the prospect of launching and supporting real youth-led startups, we also know that startups almost always fail. It’s very important your school community measures success not by the number of startups you create, but by the skills and knowledge each student develops along the way.
These skills are transferable and likely to remain in extremely high demand for the foreseeable future. Your program will not only produce genuine startup founders more likely to succeed in their ventures, but also more confident and employable students with a keen desire to contribute to the world around them.
We don’t stop at skills and inspiration - this is real
We’re about equipping your school to deliver ongoing, self-sustaining entrepreneurship programs for the benefit of all students; we’re not intent on glamourising entrepreneurship as a career path and providing short-term bursts of motivation. Building a startup is not for everyone!
For this reason, our programs are designed to provide real insights from people who have been there, done that – or who are currently in the throes of startup life themselves! Our programs are also designed with a teaching & learning focus to convey valuable concepts, frameworks and skills that will benefit all participants.
We are true believers in youth-led businesses
Our founder Shahe Momdjian first established Young Wisdom in 2007, in the summer holidays between Year 10 and 11 at North Sydney Boys High School. Since then his entrepreneurial career has brought with it a wealth of knowledge and experience he wouldn’t trade for the world - even if some lessons have been rather painful!
While working at UNSW Entrepreneurship between 2017 and 2020, he designed and managed a range of startup programs through which he helped over 150 founders and their teams get started in business. Shahe is now an experienced marketing communications professional, startup coach, business owner, recent angel investor, husband and parent to two young daughters.
Plan to offer post-program support infrastructure from the start
We believe schools who invest in entrepreneurial education need to consider the ramifications in a holistic sense. Entrepreneurship is a hugely exciting yet challenging career path with many downsides.
Inspiring and motivating students in this way comes with a great deal of responsibility.
We will work with you to provide various post-program support services so that students who “take the plunge” are not allowed to drown there.
Our Partners
Monte Sant’ Angelo Mercy College is our first school partner. In 2021, we designed and delivered a 16-week Pre-accelerator program open to all students. In 2022, continuing startups were invited to participate in our first Accelerator Program pilot.
Sprintlaw is a new type of law firm that operates completely online. They make quality legal advice accessible to small business owners and entrepreneurs. They are generously supporting our 2022 Accelerator Program pilot at Monte.
Metamorph Marketing is the marketing communications arm of Young Wisdom Pty Ltd offering promotional and educational content creation. Metamorph Marketing is supporting the 2022 Accelerator Program pilot at Monte with design mentoring.
Bramelle Partners is a chartered accounting and business advisory firm in North Sydney providing modern fixed-fee services to startup, SME and family clients. They are generously supporting our 2022 Accelerator Program pilot at Monte.
Sponsor Us
Join us to make the biggest impact possible
We need government, corporate and philanthropic partners to make our programs as widely accessible as they can be. We are passionate about public education and ensuring that NSW public high schools have equal access to the opportunities we are creating.
Among other things, we are currently designing new products and services, including teacher professional development courses and teaching materials, to ensure that all schools can create their own student entrepreneur programs and communities, even without our direct involvement if need be.
If you believe in our mission and have the capacity to sponsor our work for the benefit of public high schools in NSW, we would love to book an exploratory discussion with you today.
FAQs
Why do schools need this?
Students, parents and educators alike want this. Entrepreneurial skills are essential for the careers of today, not just the future. Given the transferable skills, multifaceted curriculum-links and broader benefits to your community, we believe you should own (not outsource) your entrepreneurship program and it should be available in some form to every student.
What if the startups fail?
The primary aim of your program will be to build transferable skills and entrepreneurial confidence in all students. ‘Startup’ failure is almost inevitable. Our aim will be to help students stress test startups so they can fail quickly and cheaply. If a particular idea falls over, students can try again and ultimately graduate with prized skills and experiences.
How do you make money?
In the short-term, we simply charge schools hourly or daily for our program design and facilitation services. You can choose whether our fees are offset by parent contributions and maybe even make a profit to reinvest into the program (e.g. via startup prizes and grants). We also offer an annual tech+services bundle to NEST startup community platform partners.