Tec students win RISE international entrepreneurship competition

Students from the Tec’s Querétaro campus have won the international RISE 2024 Awards in the “Most Collaborative Project” category with CultivArte, an initiative that impacts human rights.

The CultivArte project is made up of students from Tec de Monterrey’s School of Business on Querétaro campus, which aims to empower boys and girls from rural areas, helping them develop various soft skills.

“We’re aiming to ensure that new generations of Mexican rural populations have the perspective of making what seems impossible possible,” said Ricardo Barajas, a student from the Entrepreneurship program.

RISE is a consortium of universities called Universitas 21, which are ranked among the best in the world in the QS rankings. Its aim is to strengthen collaboration in education through four categories: impact, collaboration, innovation, and most potential.

“We won the Most Collaborative project. “For us, it means a lot that it was this category because it’s the essence of CultivArte,” said Ricardo.

Among the 17 participating countries, they were the only representative from Mexico and among the 25 projects that were presented worldwide.

Behind the scenes of participating in RISE

The national call reached the Tec, which invited students with a social entrepreneurship project to showcase their achievements at RISE.

On this occasion 2 were selected, and CultivArte was chosen from among them to represent not only Tec de Monterrey but also Mexico.

“The prize is in dollars, and the participants will receive access to a network of professional entrepreneurs to expand the scope of the project, accelerating the social business model,” emphasized Paulo Guizar Ochoa.

This process consisted of sending documents and showcasing the project to the Tec. Once they were selected, they had to produce a video talking about the competition, their project, and how they were going to use the prize.

“We’re a group of over 50 volunteers, from different universities and of different ages. There are even young people who have been with us since their third year of high school to people aged 25-26, who are very passionate about the subject of educating the new generations,” explained Ricardo.

“We won the Most Collaborative project. For us, it means a lot because it’s the essence of CultivArte.” - Ricardo Barajas.

The CultivArte team is made up of the following students from the School of Business:

• Selena Díaz Cabrera (Strategy and Business Transformation).
• Paola Sosa Cárdenas (Entrepreneurship).
• Rogelio Díaz Olvera (Entrepreneurship).
• Luis Eduardo Macedo Cortés (Entrepreneurship).
• Paulo Guizar Ochoa (Marketing).
• Joel Hurtado León (Global Business).
• Ricardo Barajas Osorio (Entrepreneurship).

CultivArte, a project for young people

“This network is already transcending more and more borders. “We’ve impacted over 40 communities and over 4,600 children,” stressed Luis Eduardo Macedo.

CultivArte is a network of young leaders that was born in Guanajuato and consists of visiting schools in rural communities every 15 days over an entire school year, to talk to them about human rights through art.

The project has positioned itself in the world with exhibitions around the Roman Colosseum, the Border Wall, Transylvania, the United Kingdom, and Colombia.

“Each session we look at a different right. “One day we look at the ‘Right to Health’ and another the ‘Right to Education,’” shared Luis Eduardo Macedo.

The central pillar of the group is to empower new generations by showing them different realities and stories through digital and hybrid storytelling resources. These children will also be able to apply the skills developed in the program.

“If you develop these soft skills in children from a very early age, it’s something they’ll be able to use for the rest of their lives, in any field,” said Ricardo Barajas.

What’s more, the students seek to ensure that the new generations have entrepreneurial, leadership, communication, critical and systems thinking, and emotional intelligence skills, so that they can develop in both their personal and professional lives.

In addition to winning the award for Most Collaborative at RISE 2024, they won the State Youth Award in Guanajuato in 2022, and they were in the Top 3 in 2023 of the UN Court of Justice Award, one of the most prestigious awards in the world.

SEGURO QUERRÁS LEER