An education champion has stars in his eyes – with ambitious plans to tackle the issue of student debt by staging a TV talent show.
But the idea may not even get through to the first round as education chiefs have refused to endorse it.
The Bright Stars Talent Series is the idea of Dr Sosthène Boussougou, of Kirk Michael, who claims he has set up a new participative student funding scheme in collaboration with Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) and the Department of Economic Development’s small business start-up scheme.
But the DED says he has not received any funding and the John Moores University has expressed concerns at its viability.
In his draft business plan, Mr Boussougou explains the scheme aims to help students pay their tuition fees and other education-related costs ‘without subjecting themselves to immense debts’.
‘We provide support in response to their financial needs, lending them a helping hand to achieve their goals and dreams,’ he states.
The Bright Stars Talent Series is designed to give students a platform to ‘showcase their skills and genius’ and offer prize money to contribute towards their tuition fees – and ‘help them realise their potential, despite their financial constraints, social background or the soaring cost of education’.
Under Mr Boussougou’s plan, a curriculum-based competition will be held in an educational institution during one half term. Prize money of £100 will be given to the winner. Parents will be asked to contribute £1 or more for the next event. Sponsorship will also be invited.
The aim then is to produce a TV show that would ‘engage the nation during five weeks’.
But LJMU ‘enterprise champion’ Debbie Elliott-Brown has told him that he has ‘significantly underestimated the cost of producing this as a TV show’.
And Ronald Barr, chief executive of the Department of Education and Children, said: ‘My initial observation is that we would not support any direct selling into our schools and I note with interest the comments by LJMU which indicate a number of issues with this proposal such as underestimation of cost, audience, sequence and timescales.
‘With such questions unanswered this is not something DEC would endorse at this time. Such a programme in my view would have to be much more closely scrutinised if some version of this were ever to be considered viable to be promoted here on the island.’
When the Examiner told Mr Boussougou we would be contacting the DEC about his project, he emailed back to say he didn’t think that was necessary as they ‘will not understand the concept’ behind this new scheme, as this was the first time such a project has ‘ever been conceived, anywhere in the world’.
A DED spokesman said: ‘Mr Boussougou had been through the small business start up scheme twice. The first time was around five years ago to teach English and he received a grant and living allowance.
‘More recently in March and April 2015 he attended SBSUS training for his talent show/creative business idea and had three action planning meetings. However, this didn’t progress to contract signing and mentoring, grant or allowance as he decided to pursue a teacher training course at LJMU instead. Therefore he is not a current client nor has he had funding for this idea from the DED.’
Mr Boussougou said: ‘I will have to write a letter of complaint to the authorities concerned for preventing us from working on the island.’