Creative Spark is a British Council programme aimed at developing enterprise education. Mediamax will provide updates on the implementation of the programme in cooperation with the British Council. 

The promotional video for Creative Spark

The launch of the Creative Spark programme in Yerevan Brusov State University of Languages and Social Sciences was marked by a promotional video.

Student Hrag Margaryan chose the format of video message to tell what brings together his teammates from different departments and courses three times a week.

“Do you know that our university has a Creative Spark Studio? The studio organizes fantastic camps that you simply can’t miss. At these camps you can learn entrepreneurial skills that will teach you how to open a business and help you become more competent, improve you team work abilities, develop your creativity, find inspiration, make friends and have fun. Seriously, don’t miss it! I am already involved in the camp. The places available are limited, but there will be more camps in a few weeks. You can register on our Facebook page and at the same time see what happens in the camp!”

As the video concludes, one of the trainers, Brusov University lecturer Gurgen appears to tell what he and his colleague Mariam do in Creative Spark Studio.

The non-academic “market” of linguistics

25-year-old Gurgen Karapetyan took retraining courses along with other lecturers to join the programme. After one week of training the instructors formed the groups they would teach what they had learned.

“We made some discoveries during the training. For instance, there are qualities you think you have, but when you need to actually use them, you realize you only have a theoretical understanding of what to do. You start researching how it is taught in the global academic market, then you look at your local market, and the shortcomings and gaps become obvious. This issue manifests itself especially in the transition of theoretical linguistic knowledge to practical work. You realize that you won’t go far without economic and entrepreneurial knowledge.

Gurgen Karapetyan

Photo: Mediamax

Let’s assume you are a translator or a tourist guide and you want to find a good job. What does it require? It requires you to know how to promote yourself. In order to learn that, you need to learn to study your competitors and find out what specific qualities and skills you can offer that others don’t have,” said Gurgen.

One grant for three universities

Although it was Brusov University that received the grant from the British Council, the application for the grant was joint and included State Academy of Fine Arts and State Pedagogical University.

“We were working with British colleagues when we found out that the plan was to engage 500 students in Creative Spark. Brusov is a relatively small university, so we decided to involve students from other universities as well,” said Kristina Tsaturyan, Head of External Affairs and International Cooperation at Brusov University.

Kristina Tsaturyan

Photo: Mediamax

227 Brusov students signed up for the programme, and 45 have already completed it.

“In Armenia people believe you have to get your diploma first and then search for a job, and this programme teaches that you it isn’t the only way and you can create jobs for yourself and others. That is what we try to demonstrate, teach to our students through the programme,” said Kristina Tsaturyan.

According to her, the students are so excited to attend the Creative Spark Studio that the university is thinking of including the programme in the curriculum or making it permanent in some other way.

Creative Spark is a five year initiative designed to support international university and institutional partnerships to develop enterprise skills and creative economy across seven countries in Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan), South Caucasus (Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia) and Ukraine through UK support. 

Due to the success of year one of the Creative Spark, the British Council announced it would fund a further 12 international partnerships. Each partnership will receive a maximum of GBP 40,000.

The applications for the grant will be accepted here from April 1 to May 12, 2019.

Lusin Mkrtchyan 

Photos: Emin Aristakesyan 

The series about “Creative Spark” on Mediamax.am is supported by the British Council.