LEADERSHIP & INFLUENCE QUESTION
Chevening is looking for individuals that will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer. (minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words) I want to be a Chevening scholar because it is not only an entity that provides financial support for postgraduate scholarships, but it also creates a worldwide network of professionals and future leaders. I am an Industrial Designer who started making toys as a result of my final degree thesis work. The project was about design contributions for non sexist kid’s toys, and it was performed with the participatory action research method and with social design perspective. This work was awarded with a research scholarship in the most important national research agency in Uruguay (ANII), and was honored by the highest degree at the University. I have always got the initiative to go further and do my very best at pursuing excellence in all projects I have been involved in: personal, academic and professional ones. I am the kind of person who believes that hard work and compromise are the only things you need to succeed. I deeply understand the importance of teamwork, being complemented by people’s knowledge, sharing ideas and helping others in their own projects. I am a designer who has always been involved in Uruguayan design change. When I was a degree scholar I was co-founder of the Scholar’s Union, created in order to have a representative voice in our University’s Council Meetings, and for one year I was the student’s delegate in those meetings. Nowadays, I am working in an entrepreneurial project based on my thesis work called ‘BILU Toys’, with the aim of turning it into an international toy design company. The project is lead by my sister -a cultural manager- and I. We are having Endeavor’s guidance in order to achieve that goal, a global organization that provides support for high impact entrepreneurs through a global network of mentors and business leaders. In addition to that, I am working in the conformation of a business partnership between toy makers around Uruguay called ‘Club de Juguetes’ (‘Toy’s Club’). Our objective is to join designers, artists and prominent artisans, in order to create a network and boost the toy’s industry in Uruguay and the region. The toy’s club is now formed by six different entrepreneurial projects based in national designs of cultural products for local and worldwide market. 370 words.
NETWORKING QUESTION
Chevening is looking for individuals with strong networking skills, who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your networking skills, and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future. (minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words) As a toy maker in Uruguay, I lead the conformation of the Toy’s Club, a local network of designers, artists and prominent artisans who want to boost the toy’s industry in Uruguay and the region. We realized that united we could share experiences and economize efforts to propel ours enterprises. Our intention is to design cultural products, that means, products that promote identity values and have a special significance for people, toys that help kids to understand the richness of world’s social diversity in which they are growing. That characteristic entails the opportunity to acquire local Government's support, and international organization’s founding programmes. The recent incorporation to Endeavor comes with an entire network of business leaders and entrepreneurs like me, from different areas and parts of the world. This is a really important value of becoming a member of this movement because networking is an essential activity for them. Owing to my compromise with the strengthening of the design industry, I became an honorary professor at the Republic’s University in Uruguay (UDELAR), in a research methodology subject and in a design theory subject at the Industrial Design School (EUCD), dependent of the Faculty of Architecture (FARQ). Nowadays, the school is organizing a short postgraduate educational course focused in toy design, with the intention to probe future students and industries’ interest in the conformation of a Toy Design Master Programme, located in Uruguay for students of all South America. With this scholarship, I want to improve my academic skills in order to contribute to the academic training of future designers of the toy industry, designers committed to Latin Americans’ needs and values, ready to promote the industry development and growth. I think that people are the most important value that we have in life and also in business. For that reason I believe that getting interesting individuals of all areas and sharing projects or opinions with them, make us and our ideas growth. 323 words.
STUDYING IN THE UK QUESTION
Outline why you have selected your chosen three university courses, and explain how this relates to your previous academic or professional experience and your plans for the future. *Please do not duplicate the information you have entered on the work experience and education section of this form (minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words)
CAREER PLAN QUESTION
Chevening is looking for individuals who have a clear post-study career plan. Outline your immediate plans upon returning home and your longer term career goals, considering how these relate to UK priorities in your country. * UK priority areas can be found on your country page of the Chevening website (minimum word count: 50 words, maximum word count: 500 words)
