High School Business Challenge
The largest business competition in Central and Eastern Europe for high school students - The High School Business Challenge. The goal of the Challenge is to give high school students the opportunity to develop their confidence, expertise and provide them with the unique chance to test themselves in this field.
European Foundation for Entrepreneurship Development (Warsaw, Poland) engages high school students in activities that increase their competence in the labor market. Lack of entrepreneurial skills among high school students in V4 countries and insufficient possibilities to develop confidence in the fields of business, entrepreneurship, and teamwork make them less likely to make risky decisions, which holsters them from starting their own business. According to the Eurobarometer, 51% of the EU citizens are more eager to be an employee rather than be self-employed. In the Visegrad countries, on average 11.5% of people are not willing to be self-employed (vs 5,6% in the EU) due to their low confidence in their entrepreneurial skills. The goal is to give high school students the opportunity to develop their confidence, expertise and provide them with the unique chance to test themselves in this field. How do they do it?
During the four stages, participants have the opportunity to test and develop their knowledge, creativity and soft skills, as well as gain business experience in a series of tests and case studies. The first three stages take place in each country and the best teams meet during the international final in Warsaw.
The series of events were held in a form of competition in July 2021. After the registration period, students completed introductory online tests. Altogether, 1936 students participated in the first round of the competition (880 from Poland, 568 from Hungary, 157 from Slovakia, 331 from Czech Republic) which shows increasing interest of students in entrepreneurship. After two rounds of competitive activities, the best team from each country was selected to International Finale as the one of V4 country representative. During International Finale in Warsaw, teams had to solve 2 case studies in a written and team-building forms. The results were announced during Official Gala in Warsaw Stock Exchange building with the winning team “GBAS Flexers C.B.” from Slovakia!
The first six years of the competition took place in Poland, and since last year it has grown to include students from all the countries of the Visegrad Group: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The implementation of this project wouldn’t be possible without the project partners – Faculty of International Relations, Prague University of Business and Economics (Prague, Czech Republic); Central Europe Association (Budapest, Hungary); Student parliament of the Faculty of National Economy (Bratislava, Slovak Republic).
