Young Inventors Club - Inventing Intro

Young Inventors Club
The Young Inventors' Club is a non-profit organisation run by inventor Tony Waithe. It organises field trips, workshops and classroom-based community activities targeted mainly at pupils of secondary schools. Its funding comes from private donors and government grants.

Overview
Big businesses and Government are keen to harness the imagination of young people.

But even if no-one is interested in young people's ideas, they should not be disheartened. For some of the greatest inventions known to Mankind have been ignored, or dismissed as impossible, by their peers.

If students believe in themselves, their visions, and their ability to improve society, they will never stop trying to be innovative and to get others to believe in their dreams.

The Young Inventors Club is designed to support the work of educational establishments in helping young students understand career and business opportunities. We want to help them make their innovations more than just ideas.

Aims
The Young Inventors' Club aims to help educational establishments provide students with an interactive, educational and fun introduction to technology and innovation in the 21st Century.

We work with students, mainly in the age range 11-18, to stimulate an interest in science, technology and innovation through both classroom-based activity and field trips.

The Young Inventors Club is establishing working relationships with some of the most important organisations in this area, including the Science Museum, the Business Innovation Centre, the Thames Barrier and the Design Museum.

We are committed to developing educational and career prospects - an area that needs revitalising in this country if we are to meet the technological demands of business.

The Young Inventors Club has been visiting schools in the Greater London Region since 2000, running Career Insight and Industry days.

Feedback from these interactive sessions has been excellent. Now more and more schools are setting up their programmes to include days with the Young Inventors Club.

Benefits of the Scheme
Through partnerships with a wide range of organisations, from interactive museums to innovative corporations, the Young Inventors Club can work with schools to offer real-world inspiration. This is done through:

• Workshops & classroom-based activities
• Guided tours & field trips
• Young Inventors' Website

Students will gain:
• Inspiration, motivation and self-belief
• Focus
• Real-life experience

In addition, exposure to the business-side of innovation will help them:
• Gain a higher respect for formal qualifications
• understand how companies go about their day to day business
• choose subjects that will lead to an appropriate career.
• learn directly from companies how new recruits achieve promotion
• learn job descriptions and better career expectations
• make better subject and career choices
• gain access to sponsorship for further education

Information and learning opportunities include:
• why companies believe in the youth of Britain
• curriculum subjects which make students more attractive to business

What's on Offer
Representatives of the Young Inventors Club, including teachers (former, graduate and practising), innovators, mentors and inspirers, can be made available for school day visits and as escorts for external day trips to London venues. School parties are expected to be accompanied by teachers as per standard practice. Costs are normally borne by Education-Business Partnerships and corporate sponsors where appropriate.

The Young Inventors Club creates synergy with organisations to help young students become better and more positive. Therefore creating a healthier society for everyone.

1. Workshops & classroom-based activities
Sessions include a wide range of topics and formats, tailored for each class and age-group. These are used to prepare for a day trip, as in 2. below.

Formats include:
Normally three or four 45 minute classes per day made up of interactive sessions
• using internet, Q&A, discussion, quizzes and competitions
• using magazines and art to formulate and sketch ideas

Content includes:
• Entrepreneurial motivation and design
• Researching existing products to see if your idea is novel
• How other inventions were protected, developed and promoted
• Prototyping
• Promotions, marketing campaigns & the publicity industry, including journalism
• Sales and retail
• Caring about yourself and the environment
• Health and safety, clothing and protective gear
• Conclusion , feedback and follow-up ideas

2. Guided tours & field trips
The examples below show some of the great places available in London. Of course, there are also very many worthwhile field trips outside the capital. Packages can be tailored for individual schools as required.

The excursions are designed to provide a context to show how inventors developed their ideas for their own historical and geographical environment.

Field trips include:
• Business Innovation Centre
• The Science Museum
• Thames Barrier
• RAF Museum
• Millennium wheel
• Pollocks Toy Museum
• The Design Museum
• The Tower Bridge Experience
• Science for Life
• London Transport Museum
• Wellcome Trust
• Institute of Contemporary Arts
• Innovative companies

3. Young Inventors' Website
The Young Inventors Website is used as an integral part of the sessions, giving students the opportunity to interact and supporting projects to demonstrate to their parents, teachers and peers what they have learned.

It is set up to help students realise their potential and just as importantly, to direct students to learn and understand more about the world of industry and how they can achieve a successful academic future and career foundation.

Methodology
The aim is to give students a modern understanding of the relationships between invention, innovation, science, design and technology and their realisation by business for the creation of jobs & wealth.

The Young Inventors' Club field trips and workshops aim to cover a wide range of learning opportunities, including:
• Group Brainstorming of common problems
• providing wider understanding of environmental awareness
• involving computers and the internet to locate relevant information
• presenting issues taking place in the local boroughs
• demonstrating what is going on outside their own environment

Experience has shown that one of the best ways to deliver this information is through interactive communication. For example:
• students say something about themselves
• students suggest something they would like to change
• computers and the internet are used as tools
• common inventions - such as a bike - are introduced, explaining the benefits, including to the environment, and the process of development and manufacture.

The students then begin the process of creating, focusing, inspiring and finally progressing in their chosen subject.

Partners
The Young Inventors' Club is aiming to build relationships with a number of partner organisations which share its vision and values. These include:

The London Central Education Business Alliance
This new consortium has been set up in Central London to develop an intranet with access to all schools in the Greater London Region. It can attract a potential 10,000 students during projects, and will continue to attract more. During school Projects, the Young Inventors Website will be linked to this consortium.

Tony has a rich cultural heritage. His parents are from the Caribbean, but he was born in Kendal, North England, moving down to London as a child.

When Tony was at school he craved the excitement of a real outdoors/adventure lifestyle. At 12-years-old he joined the Air Training Cadets where he went on to learn to fly light aircraft, to parachute and climb mountains - just some of the skills and team leadership qualities which can be gained through the cadets. In cross-country running, Tony won gold medals for his county and went on to qualify for the England team.

An inventor is not a one-man band - they have to relate to manufacturers, designers and a whole raft of people and organisations. Being a cadet gave Tony more than physical strength and endurance: it instilled in him a strong sense of self-reliance, the importance of self-discipline and team spirit.

It was while Tony was studying Engineering & Science at the North London College that he came up with his first good ideas and realised how very difficult it was to convince people that they were worth developing.

Tony's designs - including a folding fire-escape ladder and a revolutionary bicycle saddle - led to his first television appearances on BBC, ITV and C4, and in 2000, he won a Bronze medal for the bicycle saddle at the world's largest invention exhibition in Geneva.

He has always had an avid interest in working with students and introducing them to the fields of invention and technology - particularly in the light of his own experiences of the difficulties young innovators have in developing their ideas into finished products and services.

Tony is now a member of NELC (National Employers Liaison Committee) working to bridge the gap between Education & the world of Business & Industry.

Cost
A typical service would consist of one day per week, per school, made up of 4 classes of 45 minutes, and charged at £340+VAT. In addition, expenses are payable and travel time is chargeable pro rata; one to two days' consultancy is normally required to discuss and prepare course content and materials.

Costs for day trips depend on the amount of preparation and organisation required and are available on application.

Next step
Please contact Tony Waithe, founder Young Inventors' Club, on tel: Telephone: 07812 796 494; email: tonywaithe@gmail.com; email: tonywaithe44@hotmail.com, to set up a consultation.