Fortrose Academy girls to compete in finals of prestigious national competition

FOUR Fortrose Academy pupils have reached the finals of a prestigious national competition as a part of an initiative aiming to carve out space for young women in a heavily male-dominated industry.

Growing Future Assets in an annual competition challenging teams of girls in Scottish schools to pitch a company to a group of investment professionals, in an aim to introduce more young women to the world of investment. Out of the 82 schools who entered, Fortrose Academy’s Intuitive Surgical team is among the five senior finalists.

The Fortrose Academy team, made up of S5 Business Studies pupils, is Sarah Finlayson, Alex Macdonald, Allysha Cameron and Loreta Vitola.

Explaining more about the competition, Loreta said: “Growing Future Assets is an investment competition — so we got a list of businesses to choose from, and then we made a presentation to try and convince people to invest in it.

“We picked Intuitive Surgical. It’s a surgical company based in California, who use artificial intelligence (AI) and robots to operate on people, making it less invasive, reducing human error and reducing recovery times. “

Alex added: “We saw the potential it would have in the future, because one of the questions we had to answer was ‘Where do you see this business in five years?’ and with the development of AI and technology, we see this company growing in success.”

Representing their robotics-cantered company, the young women created a robot head named Dave, as their mascot.

Sarah explained: “There’s more people named Dave in the UK financial industry than there are women. So we’re saying budge up Dave! That’s the slogan for the competition, to encourage more women to join the industry.”

To secure their place in the finals, the group had to create a slideshow as well as a 3-minute pitch video, featuring their three best arguments.

Alex said: “In the finals, which are taking place in Edinburgh in March, we have to make a 10-minute presentation in front of the judges and other schools, and they are allowed to ask questions — so we have to know everything about Intuitive Surgical!”

Sarah added: “It’s a lot of work to memorise everything! But we are very excited.”

As a part of the competition, the Fortrose team have also received the specialist help of Colin Dishington from equity specialist company, Martin Currie.

Speaking of the help they received from Colin, Sarah said: “He knows exactly what to put into the presentation, which was really, really helpful — we put him up for a mentorship award.”

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Alex added: “He even managed to use his personal connections to get us a trip to Glasgow, to visit the Golden Jubilee Hospital and see the da Vinci Surgical System in action!”

Winners of the prestigious competition will take home £1000 for their school, as well as getting a voucher each. But the impact of the project has extended further than the competition itself, with all four of the Fortrose girls eager to pursue a career in business or finance, after getting a taste of the industry through the competition.

Sarah said: “We’ve made quite a few connections within the financial industry because of the competition which helps a lot.”

Allysha added: “It’s a good thing for our CV too, it can really help boost it. It’s a great way to get our foot in the door.

“I even sent an email to the school, to ask if we can introduce Higher Economics and Advanced Higher Business, which isn’t available here — but we’re really hoping to get enough numbers and push for it!”

Fortrose Academy Business Education teacher, Claire Robertson said: “They have been absolutely fantastic. They’ve been in here every week, emailing Colin in their own time… they’ve been amazing and so dedicated.

“It’s given them so much confidence — I would highly recommend the competition.”

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