Young Chamber in Europe

I have just got back from my European trip to Bordeaux where I was invited to speak by the European Commission  at the Comenius Regio Conference about the innovative work we are doing through the Young Chamber concept. It is interesting to learn that many of the conversations that we have in the UK about how to effectively engage local business and schools in support of a young persons understanding about enterprise/entrepreneurship is also happening throughout Europe. This is a common issue not just in the UK or Europe but around the world as my previous conversations with the World Chamber Federation have concurred.
From my perspective I view this issue to be about effective 'economic development' and how we grow and develop business for the benefit of our communities. This has led to the very logical conclusion that for effective economic development we need to include within our plans and strategies a clear framework of support which includes planning for the future and how we link up with and engage the next generation of employees and employers.
Hence the development of Young Chamber which can provide an easy to understand consistent framework of Business School engagement, working with and through local business networks like the Chambers of Commerce who exist in nearly every town and city across the world. Through this process, we can tap into a vast range of local businesses who can provide young people in their local schools with a greater understanding of business and the fantastic range of jobs opportunities that exist for them post education.

At the conference I made comment that the next generation of men and women entering the world of work will come from a very diverse range of academic and vocational abilities as well as a diverse range of backgrounds. All young people are important and have 'place' in society, our challenge is how we connect with all of these young people at a far earlier age in order to start the conversation about future opportunities post education.
This is what we are trying to do through the concept of Young Chamber setting up local support through existing networks bringing a range of benefits not just to the young people, but to the schools and to the local business communities in which we operate.To date, we know that this framework can work. We now need partners and local communities to work with us to bring benefit to many more young people, not just the few.