From coaching apprentices and visiting GCHQ to launching a book, running for Headway and planting the seeds of new school partnerships, summer 2026 was a quarter that captured everything acornITy is about.

From a primary school science lab in Batley to a university entrepreneurship centre in Leeds, June was a month that captured everything acornITy is about – STEM, sustainability, enterprise and the quiet work of helping people believe in what they can do.

Steve Denniss reflects on the forward-thinking vision of the young innovators who shaped the Mayor’s Big Ideas Challenge 2025 and inspired the “Entrepreneurs and Gamechangers” event.