Dublin teens represent Ireland at Global Innovation and Enterprise Competition in California

A team of bright young innovators from St. Fintan’s High School in Sutton, Dublin 13 represented Ireland at the SAGE World Cup in San Francisco, with their project Off Grid. Delegations from over 20 countries travelled to the United States to compete at the event which ran from August 8th – 11th, 2019 at the University of California, Berkeley. 

Off Grid, whose Young Social Innovators project began with the aim of improving their school's energy efficiency through the installation of solar panels, quickly realised the difficulties in accessing funding for the retrofitting of school buildings. They expanded their aims to include campaigning for change at policy level in Ireland. Applying what they had learned on their own journey and, with the aim of helping others, they subsequently created a Sustainable Energy Community (SEC), a network for other schools and community buildings to join to enable them to gain access to renewable energy grants as well as professional mentoring and guidance from SEC officials and the Off Grid Team.

Having come through the Young Social Innovators Programme in 2018 and winning the Make Our Future More Sustainable Award, Off Grid was selected for YSI’s Elevate Programme, which connects teams who have created impactful social innovations and enterprises with specialists in areas such as funding, strategy, PR and communications, enterprise development and innovation. They were subsequently selected by YSI, the National Coordinator for SAGE, as Ireland’s representatives at this year’s World Cup.

Speaking from California Ethan Dodd from Off Grid said: “It was an honour to represent Ireland at the competition. The experience alone was hugely valuable and we’ve learned so much as we’ve grown Off Grid from a school-based idea to, what we hope can become, a replicable model for others seeking to reduce energy consumption and better protect our planet. We look forward to continuing to expand the reach of the project. We’d like to thank our Principal and our teacher Wissam Abdel Samad who were a huge support from day one”.

Rachel Collier, CEO of Young Social Innovators, who was also in San Francisco as a member of the International Judging Panel, said “initiatives like the SAGE World Cup provide an important platform for these bright young entrepreneurs to showcase their ideas and to realise their potential as change makers. We are incredibly proud of the team from St. Fintan’s High School on what they have achieved and I congratulate them and their teachers on coming this far, I look forward to seeing what’s to come from them in the future

The experience alone was hugely valuable and we’ve learned so much as we’ve grown Off Grid from a school-based idea to, what we hope can become, a replicable model for others seeking to reduce energy consumption and better protect our planet. We look forward to continuing to expand the reach of the project.