Tiffin Girls’ School pupil Sarah Staveley-Taylor stepped into the Dragons’ Den earlier this month, when she took part in a special course designed to help students unleash their entrepreneurial talents.

The group of 40 pupils spent three days at the BT-sponsored course in Ipswich finding out how to turn their creative engineering ideas into reality, before showing off their work to a panel of stern judges from the company.

During the course, the ambitious students learned how to use software development kits to build solutions from readily available parts, and discovered how to adopt the right commercial model for the business.

Phil Lennard, education outreach director at BT, said: “It was inspiring to see the students become engaged in the event so quickly - they embraced the technology and seized upon the opportunities and challenges that technology can often bring.

“Additionally, it was really impressive to see them work together to form cohesive and effective teams, especially as most of them had never met before.

“Seeing these young people develop their ideas into potentially excellent revenue generating opportunities was just excellent.”

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