The Junior Achievement Cyprus in collaboration with eight stakeholders: The Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics, Karaiskakio Foundation, Cyprus Oncology Society, Cyprus Federation of Patients’ Associations, Cocoon Creations, IDEA, Cyprus Seeds and CYENS Centre of Excellence, has launched for the first time in Cyprus the ‘Beyond Pre-Accelerator Programme’ which will be delivered between November 13, 2021 and April 29, 2022 into three main phases: The ‘Educational Phase’, the ‘Test and Development Phase’ and ‘Demo Day Championship’.
This educational and practical programme will offer the opportunity to university students (Bachelor’s, Master’s, PhD) to get involved with the entire entrepreneurial process i.e., from generating business ideas and finding innovative solutions to healthcare challenges, to creating a minimum viable product in the field of oncology. As part of the Programme students from different disciplines such as Medicine, IT, Engineering, Business and other will be invited to create multidisciplinary entrepreneurial teams and join forces in order to develop models that focus on improving different areas in the field of oncology including prevention, early diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation, psychological support, reintegration and palliative cares and development of case reports, data collection and application of research methods for data analysis.
The ‘Beyond Pre-Accelerator Programme’ has been advertised to all undergraduate and postgraduate students of the University of Nicosia Medical School and a total of thirteen Students from the MD Programme, the MBBS Programme, the Master in Public Health and the MSc in Family Medicine Programme are participating in this initiative. In addition to the University of Nicosia Medical School, students from the University of Cyprus, the Cyprus University of Technology, the University of Central Lancashire Cyprus, the European University Cyprus, Frederick University, The Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics, Imperial College London, Lancaster University and the Queen Mary University London are also participating in this initiative.
As part of the first ‘Educational Phase’ phase, the students participated in a two-day Bootcamp on November 13 and 14, 2021, during which the working teams were formed and the initial discussions regarding the development of a model had taken place. The teams will continue to collaborate via online trainings in order to finalize the product which will be presented on February 5, 2022 for evaluation. The best projects will proceed to the ‘Test and Development’ phase which will be completed on the ‘Demo Day’, on April 29, 2022 when the best model will be selected.
If you would like to learn more and keep up with the news of the programme you can visit the Junior Achievement Cyprus website www.jacyprus.org