We’re keen for Tararua.

Join over 4,500 high school students who have mastered business with the Ripyl framework, sharpening their problem-solving skills and unlocking creativity along the way!

Why Ripyl?

Ripyl® is a programme dedicated to help young people to be more empathic through their journey, getting in the ‘shoes’ of others and understanding their perspective. The programme was piloted in 2019, across schools in the Manawatu. Since, Ripyl® has made changes to the programme so that all students, from Year 5 through Year 13 can experience the Ripyl® effect.

Ripyl® is currently running in schools across New Zealand in a variety of formats.

The Programme

Ripyl® uses design thinking to assist young people in authentic learning environments. Through our programme, students use their creativity to become more curious, more confident, and more resilient.

Ripyl® captures raw, enthusiastic creativity and uses the process to mature thinking and develop originality and limitless vision. And being true to our name, the ‘ripyl®’ effect challenges friends and family of our students to think creatively, build empathy and strengthen their own connections and relationships. WHY? Because the world needs more problem solvers!

Here’s what the student can expect -

Student Learning

  • Learn soft skills, which we call essential skills, like empathy, compassion, resiliency, teamwork, communication, and problem-solving.

  • Create new networks in the community

  • Understand that problem-solving is a core tool that everyone needs moving forward

  • Learn the subject of business/commerce in a fun, tangible way.

Programme Structure

Ripyl® can be constructed to run in several ways. These are fully customisable to you and your school and can be run in a day, a term, across multiple terms or the entire school year. Ripyl® can also be delivered in an extra-curricular setting. The programme structure follows these core principles -

  • Empathy

  • Problem Solve

  • Validation

  • Iteration

The Final

Usually, students join teams, work together, and produce an outstanding solution to a defined problem. The final is the end of the program and can be customised accordingly. Usually, the final consists of either a pitch or a demo for a panel of experts.

Case Study
New Zealand High School

In the video below, you’ll see Ripyl® in action during Term 3 of 2024. The programme involved over 125 students across five classes, forming more than 30 teams. These teams competed in a pitch heat, with the Top 8 advancing to battle it out in the first week of Term 4 for the grand prize.

Winning Best Youth Programme in New Zealand

In 2023, Ripyl was awarded New Zealand’s Best Youth Programme by Global Entrepreneurship Network (Ripyl, at that stage, was being run under our holding company, The Brave Venture). It was completely unexpected as we were up against well-established programs, some had been running for 30+ years, including Young Enterprise.

What made Ripyl stand out?

  • Innovation
    A novel, new way to teach basic and complex business fundamentals to students based on global frameworks.  The world needs more entrepreneurs, right?

  • Problem-solving
    We weren’t just another business course. We made learning real, hands-on, and engaging.  And we made it relevant so the students that were learning topics were learning from brands, businesses and models they knew and saw every day.

  • Challenging the Status Quo
    Business and commerce are taught in schools, but they’re often seen as the “dummy subject”, outdated, undervalued, and stuck in the 1980s. While students learn about historical figures like Albert Einstein as entrepreneurs, the curriculum rarely highlights modern visionaries like Rod Drury from Xero or Steve Jobs from Apple. Ripyl changed that.

Winning was humbling, but more than anything, it reinforced that this work matters.

Innovation Day
Awatapu College

We ran our Innovation Day at Awatapu College in Manawatū. Innovation Days are a fast-paced, high-energy version of the Ripyl programme - a pressure-cooker environment where students test their creativity and problem-solving skills, tackling real-world challenges. They develop everything from logos and branding to budgets and go-to-market strategies. For this event, we used our proven Food Truck Challenge. The day finished with all teams pitching their final business models to a panel of local judges.

Join the Wave!

Don’t let another year go by feeling overwhelmed, unprepared, or alone. Ripyl® can help! Reclaim your time, inspire your students and transform your teaching with confidence today!