News

Montenegro’s business challenge –X “School of entrepreneurship and innovation for the young” is a project run by Student Business Center now for 10^th year in a row at the UDG institution, held in the period of 21.-23. of January 2020. The vision behind this innovative challenge is to waken the exploratory spirit of high school students, to introduce them to the world of entrepreneurship and innovation as well as the importance of applied digital technologies.

This business challenge is traditionally held in the last week of the winter school break, and the host of the project was the University of Donja Gorica. This year as well, the project was supported by the Ministry of Education Montenegro, Board of capital market, Statistical office of Montenegro – MONSTAT, JU House of students Podgorica, and companies Crnogorski Telekom – T-com, ComTrade and PLC Moraca, as well as the organization of Junior achievements in Serbia.

The philosophy of the SBC team is that business challenges are all around us! For the purpose of the realization of the project, we visited many different high schools with the belief that every one of us has a talent – a gift. The team of SBC came up with activities that will encourage young people in the purpose of discovering their gift, and in the future they will be able to perfect that gift through many teaching and extracurricular activities. On that occasion, during the promotional campaign, 36 volunteers of the Student Business Center, students of the UDG, went to 22 different cities and 45 high schools, held 181 class presentations and made contact with 4217 high school seniors from all across Montenegro.

In the spirit of slogan “Only if you discover your talent you will lead your life authentically, because your life is you!” we invited all high school students in Montenegro to choose one or more areas for which they think they have talent for and to then introduce them as a business challenge. We suggested them topics that could be a subject of their interest such as: mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, entrepreneurship, innovation, research, digitalization, literature, culture, poetry and art. Now organized for the 10^th year in January this project sparked a record interest, noting hundreds of applications by high school students from different cities and schools of our country. After several selection rounds, we chose 162 students which got the opportunity to participate in Montenegro’s business challenge.

Montenegro’s business challenge, this year as well as the previous ones, gave the opportunity to the chosen students, that in the morning period of their three day competition, they were able to listen to the lectures of eminent experts from the country and abroad on the topics mentioned above, which were highlighted by the students as the subject of their interest. To name a few of this year’s lecturers: dr Veselin Vukotić, prof. dr Zoran Đikanović, prof.dr Nenad Vujadinović, dr Sandra Tinaj, mr Tiho Vujović, mr Aleksandar Vujović, mr Nikola Mićunović, Darko Radičanin, Enes Banda, David Knežević, Anđela Popović, Armin Ćatović and Balša Lompar.

Additionally, in the framework of morning lectures, on the second day of the project the students were addressed by various participants of this project from previous ten years of its realization. The successful young people in question are: Stefan Pižurica, Nina Drakulić, Nikola Pejović, Ajla Mustafalić, Dunja Popović, Vanja Pejović, Andrea Mićanović, Dino Topalović, Marko Vukčević i Anđela Marunović.

In the afternoon period the participants had the opportunity to work on the solution of the business challenge, and before that they were divided into groups, so that every team was composed of students from the north, south and seaside region of Montenegro. In addition to the expert and motivational lectures, students could hear more on how to become an entrepreneur, which practices are offered abroad, successful start up stories of our students, as well as how to participate in interactive team building activities.

On the last day of the competition, in front of a commission made up from five people, the participants presented their real solutions of the business challenge. Members of the commission were: Darko Radulović (ComTrade), Marjan Popović (Crnogorski Telekom), Nemanja Glavinić (Junior Achievement Serbia), Balša Lompar (University of Donja Gorica) i Luka Tomković (Student Business Center) .

The best 20 high school students – winners of Montenegro’s business challenge, which are going to represent Montenegro at the regional competition Western Balkans Business challenge are:

• Alen Mustagrudić – Secondary Medical school– Podgorica
• Amar Kurpejović –School of Economics and Hospitality– Bar
• Anastasija Musić – Highs chool “Petar I Petrović Njegoš” – Podgorica
• Anja Radulović – Gymnasium “Slobodan Škerović” – Podgorica
• Belma Markišić – Secondary school “Bećo Bašić” – Plav
• Boško Femić – Gymnasium “Slobodan Škerović” – Podgorica
• Husein Bralić – Gymnasium “30. Septembar” – Rožaje
• Itana Samardžić – Secondary art school “Petar Lubarda” – Cetinje
• Ivana Popović – Secondary Economic School “Mirko Vešović” – Podgorica
• Josipa Čelanović – Secondary art school “Petar Lubarda” – Tivat
• Lana Savović – Gymnasium “Slobodan Škerović” – Podgorica
• Milena Bojanić –School of economics and hospitality– Nikšić
• Milena Šućur – The first secondary vocational school - – Nikšić
• Miljan Bajčeta – Secondary vocational school – Pljevlja
• Nemanja Dragišić – Gymnasium “Slobodan Škerović” – Podgorica
• Petar Dževerdanović –School of economy– Nikšić
• Sara Krpuljević – Gymnasium “Slobodan Škerović” – Podgorica
• Selima Musić – Secondary school “Bećo Bašić” – Plav
• Željko Bolević – Secondary school “Bećo Bašić” – Plav
• Željko Tanjević – Gymnasium “Tanasije Pejatović” - Pljevlja

And by this our  high school students – participants of the competition Western Balkans Business challenge which in April will be held in Croatia, are going to be in teams consisting of 80 of the best students from 4 neighboring countries: Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro.