Amid the doom and gloom of the recession and the uncertainty of recent political events, it made a refreshing change last week to be at a business event where positive thinking and hope for the future were the order of the day. That the event involved several school children partly explains the positive atmosphere, not least because their attendance meant both a day in London and a day off school. But the energy was so high because these kids were at the IoD for an awards ceremony celebrating their roles as some of the UK's most promising future entrepreneurs.

The event was the handing out of gongs for the Make Your Mark With a Tenner campaign run by Enterprise UK. The idea is a simple one—to give school children aged 8 to 18 a £10 note and set them the challenge of making as much money as possible in a month. They can join forces with fellow students to pool their £10s or go it alone. The only rule is that nothing illegal can be done with the money. Once they've given the initial £10 back they can either keep the profits or give them to charity, with the emphasis being on encouraging the latter. This year some 28,000 children took part and as in previous years, Enterprise UK expects over 97 per cent of the original stakes to be returned.

I was a judge for this year's awards and was genuinely blown away by the scope, originality, creativity and quality of the entries. My personal favourite was Danny Sharmer, who won the Director Special Commendation Award for his Indian snack food business which made him £300 in a week. Danny displayed all the classic entrepreneurial traits as well as giving all his profits to a less than glamorous homeless charity in his hometown. Other projects included a scheme for school children to teach old people how to use the internet, a group of primary school children who customised T-shirts and a boy who devised a village cookbook using recipes supplied by local residents.

Much is written about the flaws in the UK education system and about what's broken in our society, among young people especially. This experience taught me just how positive, composed and confident many of our young people are. It also showed me that there is a huge amount of entrepreneurial talent and energy in our schools and colleges and given the opportunity to show it, kids just can't help creating something exciting. A recent report by mobile phone firm Orange found that while over half of the UK have thought about starting a business, less than 10 per cent have done so. Hopefully schemes like MYM will encourage more of these children to have the courage to take the plunge.

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