“Makers of Tomorrow”: Federal Chancellery starts a foundation course
“I never would have thought that politics could be so fast,” says Ijad Madisch, Researchgate founder and member of the German Digital Council about the “Makers of Tomorrow“-Program of the Federal Chancellery in the video call. “Makers of Tomorrow” is an online course for students that aims to encourage young people at German-speaking universities to start a business. The federal government’s initiative started on November 1 and will initially run until February 28, 2022.
“Makers of Tomorrow” consists of a series of ten digital videos in which founders from Germany and Silicon Valley describe their stories. Also there are Madjid Salimi, Kenan Hasan and Sievert Weiss from Amboss, Eva-Maria Meijnen from Plusdental, Amorelie founder Lea-Sophie Cramer, Johannes Reck from Getyourguide, Eric Quidenus-Wahlforss and Alexander Ljung, the co-founders of Soundcloud, and others.
The contents of the Startup Master Class are made available to the students on demand. Topics of the program are: generating ideas, mindset, i.e. how do founders think, prototyping, i.e. how do you build a first product version, market analysis or the search for suitable co-founders. The first starts on November 11th Lecture series at Leuphana University.
“Makers of Tomorrow” does not require any previous knowledge and is free of charge. Since the start last week, 900 students have already signed up for 80 universities registered – “we were literally overrun,” said one of the project initiators in the video call. In the beginning, they only planned with seven to ten universities.
It is important for the initiators to also explicitly encourage students who do not come from the already startup-affine areas of economics or computer science. Humanities scholars or natural scientists and co. Should also be encouraged to start a business. In addition to the Digital Council, the project is also supported by the University Rectors’ Conference and the Federal Association of German Startups eV.
The project cost around 200,000 euros to implement, although the founders involved did not receive any money. “If I had been offered it, I would not have accepted it. For me this is a project close to my heart, ”says Johannes Reck from Getyourguide. Eva-Maria Meijnen from Plusdental is also noticeably passionate about the “Makers of Tomorrow” initiative. She found her way into the startup world far too late. “I lacked the imagination of how to start my own business. And the role models, ”she says over video.
“Makers of Tomorrow” itself pursues the character of a startup, explains Meijnen. You do something, learn and then improve the processes. In the future, it is also conceivable to expand the program beyond universities, says Ijad Madisch.
