Sowing the Seeds – Izzy Mair, City College Norwich

As I sit here in my office and look at the photos taken of the ‘Sowing the Seeds’ days (which were all the way back in 2006), my first thought is ‘wow – we look really young’.

Sowing the Seeds – for those of you who do not know, was a programme established to support young people into the world of work, enterprise and entrepreneurship. I have a dim recollection that it may have been Ruth Bullard, who, at that time, was the Enterprise Manager at Blyth-Jex School (aka Sewell Park College), who came up with the name with the view to developing the skills set of the younger generation.

Further thoughts of those days make me smile, as not only was I still teaching but it was my first contact with the Norfolk Network. I remember sitting in the Board room at the school with Bev and Lucy coming up with the concept and not really having a plan of where we were going but fearlessly, we set off on our journey.

Along the way, as you will see, we conscripted a few familiar faces – Frank, Xenia, Bev, Martin, Chris etc… became our willing business mentors, supporting the students through product realisation, marketing, finance, IP etc.

We also needed another educational ally, so you will notice Stuart Catchpole who at the time was working at Costessey High School (aka Ormiston Victory). He and I had worked together in education for several years and it seemed right that we worked together on this project. Needless to say, I too had worked at Costessey High and knew that we would have some willing volunteers in the students that went there.

We would not have been able to run the project without the support from our colleagues at BT’s innovation Centre at Adastral Park – www.atadastral.co.uk.

Below are some of the seedlings:

Students from the then Blyth-Jex School

Students from the then Costessey High School

We created some shining stars – one of whom is Sophie Connors – she sends her apologies for the 10th Birthday celebrations as she is studying in Scotland.

Those were the days and I look forward to the NNG3 phase of the Norfolk Network.