Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to our first Newsletter for 2020. It most certainly has been a very different start to this year for not only us here in Australia but for everyone around the world.

Almost immediately that our universities returned for 2020, the lockdown restrictions in each state commenced which meant some significant changes for our student teams and their Faculty Advisors.

With lectures going on line; people being encouraged to stay home; travel restrictions; social distancing and limitation and cancellation of public and private gatherings, it meant that we quickly had to re-focus.

Students began virtual meetings; projects were curtailed or radically changed in terms of the initial design and new projects related to COVID-19 began to take shape. And, of course, we had to re-think how we would conduct our Regional and National Showcases.

I’m both happy and proud to say that Enactus Australia has risen to all these challenges and turned them into opportunities. Our students continue to connect with us and each other through Zoom; they are spreading kindness and hope through their inspiring stories and projects and sharing them on social media; and our alumni committee is actively seeking to build a strong alumni association.

I couldn’t be more proud of our students and their commitment to “creating a better, more sustainable world”.

We will be conducting our Regional Showcases on line during the week of 11 to 15 May, and our National Showcase during the week of 13 July.

You can read more detail on all of these throughout this newsletter.

I am very pleased to welcome Randstad as a partner in 2020 and to have Nick Pesch, National Director Randstad Australia and Josh Rao, National Sales Manager Business Development join our Board, as well as having Supipi Jayawardena, Partnerships Manager Red Cross Australia also join.

I would like to thank our partners and our many friends of Enactus for their continued support throughout this challenging but still inspiring time for all of us.

Events and Happenings -  Country Leaders Report

The major happenings, of course, since our last Newsletter have been our change in plans to conduct our Regional and National Showcases on line.

Regional Showcases 

For our Regional Showcases, which will be conducted during the week 11 – 15 May, students are producing a video and/or PowerPoint outlining their project progress to date. These will be uploaded on our website.

We are providing our business advisers with the links to the projects, and the fillable PDF Individual Evaluation Sheets to use for their feedback and advice. Unlike the National event, this is not a judging and scoring activity, but is an opportunity to provide guidance to the students in preparation for the National Competition. Our advisers will return the feedback sheets by email to us, so that we can forward them to the teams.

We have distributed a set of guidelines for providing advice and feedback this year, given that many projects have been affected by the restrictions of COVID-19.

Students are also being provided with on line packages with great information and worksheets on Career Planning and Design Thinking as the two key topics for the Learning and Development segment of the Showcases.

National Showcase

Our National Showcase will also be conducted on line during the week of 13 July. We have been working closely with Enactus International to ensure the activity will be consistent across all countries in terms of competition requirements. We are fortunate to have the example of the UK and Canada who have already conducted on line events, and the USA who will be conducting theirs in May.

We will be using a combination of media for ceremonies, competition, judging and student participation which will include video, Launch Pad 6 and Zoom.

The upside of holding our events on line is that we can involve more judges and have more people from both here and other Enactus countries observe and/or participate in the event.

We would also like to invite any of our Alumni to participate in our National Competition as Judges.  Please contact Kylie to express your interest. Kylie's email ksmith@enactus.org

I’m looking forward to what will be a unique experience for us as we celebrate our 21st birthday of Enactus in Australia!

Our students have been very active in keeping connected. We have held 3 Zoom sessions with them now, and many of the teams are holding their team meetings this way.

While some of their projects have obviously been affected, they are in a great place for reviewing and adapting their project plans and implementation steps, and setting and measuring their outcomes going forward.

I’m delighted to have some of our teams implementing projects to address the issues created by COVID-19. Here are a few highlights. You can find more detail on our Enactus Australia LinkedIn page. https://www.linkedin.com/company/enactusaustralia-org-au/

University of New South Wales

Project Name: QuickSan

As our global communities continue their battle with COVID-19, its highly virulent nature, speed and breadth of proliferation gives rise to an urgent need for personal protective equipment and sanitary materials. The WHO projects that within the next month, there will be further demand for 2.9 million litres of hand sanitiser

Enactus UNSW's newest project, QuickSan, aims to address this by partnering with Intechchemicals to design and manufacture a more efficient, innovative line of no contact, smart hand sanitiser dispensers.

To flatten the curve, our IoT design leverages the smart delivery and maintenance of hand sanitiser to ensure effective hygiene for frontline medical staff through to public spaces. Additionally, it allows for more effective replenishment and delivers measured doses to maintain hygiene standards.

We aim to accurately and quantitatively measure our impact by obtaining direct consumer data. Our figures can also be used in contributing towards further research into COVID-19 management.

Our collaborative partner, INTECHCHEMICALS, offers its vast national distribution network and readily available manufacturing equipment and production capacity to advance our outreach and impact. Through this, we hope to be a crucial and impactful resource in helping the world fight against coronavirus.

Macquarie University

Project Name: The Women’s’ Hub

The Women’s’ Creative Hub is a secure social space providing refugee and asylum seeker women with an opportunity to connect and seek opportunities. The project has provided the women with both soft skills and confidence and income generating opportunities, particularly in making items for sale such as scarves.

However, as a result of COVID-19 restrictions, we have had to shift our focus completely to best support our women during this time. We are planning to launch on line cooking and craft classes, connect virtually via Zoom and set up an on line presence which we have already moved towards with a dedicated LinkedIn page.

The women have also turned their sewing skills into making masks – a critical need at this time. The team and their project were recently featured on Channel 7 news.

See the link below.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1O9a2YF9KChXveNQNh9vTA-aAsnHryPs2?usp=sharing

University of Technology Sydney

Activity Name: Entrepreneurship Essentials Series

UTS have taken a different approach, but one that is very valuable for the on-going development of students.

Due to the ramifications of COVID-19's escalation, Enactus UTS, like all its other counterparts, has had to make a radical pivot to our plans. This has been particularly complex for Enactus UTS, as due to the student union (ActivateUTS) with which we are affiliated, we have a responsibility to not only help our project members, but also to provide value to all of our 'general financial members', who attain this status without any approval needed from us so long as they contribute an annual $10 membership fee, which is a process mandated and managed by ActivateUTS.

Given these circumstances, we've decided to launch a program of workshops called the "Entrepreneurship Essentials Series". The purpose of this program is to help projects move from a problem space into a minimal viable product ready for user-testing and customer validation, as well as pitching, across a period of four workshops. These workshops will be premiered live on Zoom, and recorded and uploaded subsequently, completely accessible to any member of the public.

During these workshops there will be a number of activities, as well as homework. These can then be submitted within a week of the workshop premiering for detailed and high quality feedback.

Members of an Enactus Australia team will be eligible for feedback in order to preserve value for Enactus UTS' financial members, while also opening the full benefits of this program to all Enactus Australia students.

There are already officially four other Enactus branches (UNSW, MQ, ECU & Griffith) on board to participate.

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The University of Sydney

Project Name: The Cup Solution

The cup solution is an e-commerce store that sells menstrual cups. For every menstrual cup we sell, we donate one to a woman in need. The menstrual cups are donated to women’s shelters for women who are suffering from poverty, homelessness, addiction and/or domestic violence.

The issue is extremely relevant now more so than ever, as we have seen supermarkets completely stripped of sanitary items during this pandemic due to hoarding. We want to make sure that every woman has access to this absolute necessity!

Using a menstrual cup will not only help contribute significantly towards reducing waste in landfill, but also promote hygienic, sustainable living.

The University of Melbourne

Activity Name: The University of Melbourne

Their message

With the media constantly telling us about everything that’s going wrong, we just wanted to take a minute to say thank you for the few things that are going right.
Communities are coming together, we’re getting one step closer to beating this pandemic and we’re taking the time to heal and grow in the comfort of our homes.
So, thank you, to all our essential workers.
Thank you, to everyone on the front lines.
And thank YOU, for staying home and making their job a little easier.
Together, we’ll get through this!

The team took the opportunity to make a video where they offered their thanks.

To see the video please click on the link below.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1WEa8rKBDPKm2iYyvepzU-E0GEt75gpoN

Alumni News - David Ky 

Each Newsletter will feature a story from one of our alumni about their experiences in Enactus and how their participation in the program has helped shape where they are today.

We are setting up an Alumni page on our website so that we can bring you more stories, more often. This will also be a connection point for our alumni association which is currently being formed.

Our alumnus we are featuring today is David Ky.

David is from UNSW where he was Team President and was voted Most Outstanding Enactus Student for 2015

There are so many moments I treasure...frantically running around campus after a storm passed by to collect damaged umbrellas for a project...holding up Australia’s flag at the World Cup in South Africa ...but most of all, were those with friends I met in Enactus.

It has been 5 years since I have graduated but we still keep in touch and I still have not left Enactus. I joined my alma mater Business Advisory Board and am leading a working group to establish Enactus Australia’s alumni community.

Many often ask me why I am still so involved, even after all these years. I owe much of my career success to the Enactus experience and so I am always looking for ways to give back.

Enactus taught me we are all equipped with an intrinsic desire to help others. To this day, I draw upon this lesson often in my work as a project manager at Australia’s first and oldest bank – Westpac. We remove barriers for the aging communities of Australia to manage their superannuation and prepare for their financial wellbeing. The most meaningful part of my work is helping each team member and project stakeholder connect their piece of the work to the bigger picture. We achieve more together than on our own.

If any Alumni would like to participate in our National Showcase as a Judge we would love to have you involved please email Kylie to express your interest. email Ksmith@enactus.org 

Enactus International 

We are extremely grateful to all our colleagues in Enactus International for the work they are doing to ensure that every country can conduct an exciting National Competition, and for sharing stories and projects undertaken by students under our #EnactusCares program.

World Cup - Utrecht  8-10 September 2020 

They have also released news about our World Cup 2020 as follows:

While Enactus may not be on the front line of the current health crisis, Enactus students are and will be the front line of the recovery: they will help shape how we revive and thrive in the new normal. That’s why we’re adapting quickly to reach more students and academic leaders, advance the goals of more partners, and work together for a better, more sustainable world.

To help accomplish that goal, we’re pleased to announce that this year, the Enactus World Cup is going truly global and you are invited!

We’re setting our sights high, aiming to draw 10,000 participants in this international celebration of entrepreneurial solutions to the world’s greatest challenges.

The 2020 Enactus World Cup will focus on innovation across sectors, boundaries and generations of leaders to help revive communities and advance economies. It will be online and live-streamed on September 8-11 and, with the support of presenting sponsor KPMG, will feature much of what past attendees have come to love – and new programming – including

• Competition among Enactus teams worldwide and evaluation of the 1 Race 4 Oceans Race.

• Collaboration between students and partners; forums on technology and advancement of the Sustainable Development Goals; and cool, new networking opportunities - because making meaningful relationships is a part of the power Enactus!

• Celebration of our cultural diversity and our global citizenship with unique opportunities to share your pride with students worldwide.
• The People’s Choice Awards, 77-Second Film Fest of social entrepreneurship around the world, and more.

In addition, if health and travel considerations allow, Enactus will also host an exclusive event at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City in November 2020 featuring Enactus World Cup champion teams.

We’ll keep you all posted as we move towards September.