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Ok guys - I thought I would post this here as I'm interested to see people's thoughts.
I'm going to try and be brief - Here goes, a little intro on me - I am 23 years old and by profession am a Web/Graphic Designer. I work for a company in downtown London as a web designer and I also do my own freelance hustle on the side and have just landed my biggest freelance project for $10'000 (£6'000).
Ok well like all of us here - we all have aspirations and working in the industry has been good for me - Learnt a lot and marketing skills and I don't just design but I also do a bit of marketing work for the company and deal with clients.
I am planning something for the summer of 2008. If I do go ahead with it, I will have to take the risk of just dropping the safety of my full time job and go with this idea.
Here it is -
A Summer School in London - It has been done before and is going on right now also. It will be like a holiday camp cum english learning experience for teenagers from the ages of 13 - 20 years of age to come to London for English learning as well as the holiday experience.
( I have already worked in summer schools in the years of 2003, 2002 and 2001). I worked with the largest summer school org in London.
I speak fluent italian and also speak spanish and french. Now being half italian, I have really strong links with the country - I know a lot of people in different cities there and actually even know some people who work there as teachers and am in touch with a lot of students in the age range of 17-20.
What I plan to do is launch my own Summer School in London - maybe in the months of July/August as this is the two key holiday months for summer and for schools.
These students usually come for a period of 2 weeks. Some come in large groups of 20 students - some come individually.
I have seen some good stuff Summer Schools do but I could write down a whole list of bad things they do and how I would make it better.
Business is business and the way many summer schools work is - YOu make it sound good, make it sound exciting...the student's parents pay the money and once the student arrives in London - that's it. The summer school doesn't care anymore and these kids are sent to the most boring of attractions (Museums with painting which are FREE entry) - instead of taking them to real fun places of which there is plenty in London but obviously are not free.
The way it will work -
5 days a week from 9am to 12 noon will be classes. These classes will be fun discussion based classes to improve confidence and speaking.
After lunch we take them on an activity.
They come back for dinner -
In the night time after dinner one more activity.
Saturday's and Sundays - a big activity - possibly to a specific town like Oxford/Cambridge or to a Beach place practicially for the whole day.
PRICES - Per student, for week - £550 - Like I said, usually this is a 2 week programme.
Now during my years I have built up contacts - I have been in contact with a Hall in a great location in London and they have quoted me on -
£40 per night per student - this includes private room / accommodation / breakfast / dinner.
Having done my research I know no one can beat that and the Hall is great, it is big and the location is great and there is even a large bar downstairs with TV's, Pool Tables etc and the Canteen is nice and big also.
Now I have worked out - to make a decent profit I need to get a minimum of 200 people signed up for this.
Anything under 200 - the profit isn't worth it.
I have also contacts with qualified teachers and have taken their wages into consideration from this profit statement also.
I'd look to pay staff - £250 a week - With a number of 200 students, 15 staff would work. These staff would teach in the morning, and after lunch they would also be part of the group that takes the students out and about in town.
The one thing I havn't found the cost of is the hiring of classrooms in the nearby university - that is the only thing and will find that out next week.
Being a web designer I am going to use the web strongly for this - and create a site with a lot of hot features and make it very clear and obviously in different languages.
Marketing -
A really interesting thing I found out recently. Students from Italy and France who I know who went on such programmes before, I contact them and asked them "How did you find out about coming to London on such a programme" Everyone gave me the same reply.
Word of mouth - they all said - "Oh my friend said that there is this teacher in the local school that in the summer takes groups to London so I went to meet him with my parents and thats it"
These so called teachers are like agents. They come to London, obviously they are getting paid something nominal but they are getting free accommodation and also two free meals a day also so you can see the benefit from that angle for them also there.
Another obstacle - I would have to find some local agents.
However my plan is this with regards to marketing - Being english and from London and going a lot to Italy - I often go to the schools just to do talks with them in their english classes and it is pretty funny.
So I plan that when the time comes - maybe December time - Go to say a few towns in Italy - take my business partner with me who is Italian and take an English Teacher with me - We go to these schools and basically promote the package to all the students and create a buzz directly for it with freebies and just being ourself and selling our product so that these kids go home and say "Mom send me to London with these guys this summer!"
Obviously then we need to create the professional side to get the approval of the parents.
Before I finish here is my take on it - I go to one town a lot in Italy - This town has 8 High Schools there.
In each of these Schools there is roughly 500-800 students.
So a minimum of 200 - I think if done properly is very feasible. Anything more than 200 is a bonus.
Ok I will finish there for now - I will keep you guys updated if your interested and if any one has anything to say or suggest or even offer your services here please feel free.
Umar
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