Creative Kindergarten in Dubai - Business Plan Example

Creative Kindergarten Name Course Lecturer Date Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Executive Summary 4 Market Needs 5 Uniqueness of the proposition 6 Appeal to the Society and consumers 9 Main Products/Services 10 Feasibility Study 12 Supply chain and partners 15 SWOT ANALYSIS 15 Legal Obligations 17 Growth strategy 18 Cost information and balance sheet 19 Financial forecasts 20 Risk and Exit Strategy 22 As far as risk is concerned in this venture, it will be important to know the amount of risk that can be taken. This is because risk is a vital factor as far as this investment is concerned. Therefore, the risk level will be determined. This will make it possible to determine the amount of lose that can be afforded in the venture. After determining this amount of loss, the length of the business can now be determined. At the same time the determination of type of stop-loss to be used can now be possible. In this case, tighter stops will be set if less risks are wanted. On the other hand, those who want more generous returns will assume more risks. Therefore, in the case of the Kiddie Junction School, the stop-loss points will be set to avoid the normal market volatility setting the points. 22 In the exit strategy, the venture will not exit by setting a take-profit point. This is because the strategy may involve selling the business even when it is performing well. if this move is made, then considerable losses can be made. Considering the uniqueness and creativity employed in the kindergarten, this exit strategy is not good. This venture being a long-term investment, the exit point is going to be set at a critical price level, which is based on the yearly target of the kindergarten. 22 References 23 Executive Summary Dubai is one of the top ten largest cities in the United Arabs Emirates. It harbors a great number of the top class population. Among these are the managers, engineers, IT engineers, teachers, accountants, bankers, and the high-class district. Because of the workplace demands these people are more and more busy each day. Their weekly schedules are so packed that they have no much time for their children back at home. However, these people have greater need to offer their children the best environment in which they can learn. They are more concerned about preparing their kids to access information and knowledge. This can be seen by the fact that some of these are more and more willing and ready to take their children to kindergartens found far a way from their residence and pay for them so that they can access the necessary child care, knowledge and skills. The market needs for children education in Dubai are so many despite the existence of nearby kindergartens. This is because these existing kindergartens have not employed the necessary creativity in ensuring that the needs of the customers are addressed in their schools. Some of the needs for instance, which can be addressed better by creative kindergartens include provision of an environment that is secure, innovative and that enhances a sense of belonging, classrooms that are well organized and full of resources, an educational and stimulating environment, large playground to cater for the exercise needs of their children, an outdoor equipment that is excellently selected and child safe to enable the children enjoy locomotion and motor skill development and a curriculum that addresses all the educational needs of children with or without special learning needs. With this market needs analysis, innovation and creativity were employed during the planning of the creative kindergarten known as Kiddie Junction School. Unlike other kindergartens, which are only concerned with the child care and education services, this proposed kindergarten is going to be more creative. This is because it will bring in the unique idea of talent identification among the little kids. If the talent of a child is spotted at an early age, it is easy to build it early so that the child can start applying it early in his or her life. This is important because most of the people in the world became great because they used their talents. Market Needs In Dubai, one of the greatest market needs as far as kindergarten is concerned is that of getting a kindergarten that provides an environment that is secure, innovative and that enhances a sense of belonging. Another market need is that the kindergarten should have classrooms that are well organized and full of resources. A kindergarten with an educational and stimulating environment, which has the capacity of awakening the inner curiosity of the child, is also highly sought after in the market. In addition, the market looks for a kindergarten which has large playground to cater for the exercise needs of their children. In line with this, a kindergarten with outdoor equipment that is excellently selected and child safe to enable the children enjoy locomotion and motor skill development is highly sought after in the Dubai Market. Last, the other market need as far as kindergarten is concerned is that of getting an environment that is clean, safe, and vibrant. Such an environment is highly valued since it will be enjoyable, comfortable and healthy for the child. The number of people in need of these services in the kindergarten in Dubbai has grown in the past few years following the growth of residential real estate around Dubai city. The growth of the residential real estate in the area, as explained before, has been attributed to different factors. Most of the top class people have secured their residence around the place, giving an incentive to the developers to further expand the residential real estate. While the residential real estate facilities are expanding, they bring together the top class who are more and more busy attending their official duties on a daily basis. The time to be with their children is indeed limited. They cannot entrust the caretakers to offer the children all the basic educational services, neither can they trust the nearby primary schools since they deal with children who are a little bit mature. This being the case, there is a very ready market for preschoolers at Dubai city (Kowalski, 2002). Therefore, the customers will consist of the high-class district, teachers, physicians, engineers and IT engineers, accounting experts and managers. These people work in the central business district of the Dubai city. Because of the fact that the location is a prime residential place that brings together the high class, the rental charges are too high for the middle class and the low class. However, within these different people, their needs for their children may vary depending on their financial status. This is because the wages for the different categories are not the same. Therefore, the kindergarten market will be segmented in such a way that the clients are given the opportunity to decide on the kind of services they want their children to receive. Some of the services will be mandatory to all the children while some will be optional. Among the mandatory services is the educational training service, catering service. For the case of sleep break, it will be available only for the younger category of children. Transport service on the other hand will also be left for the parents to decide (Kurtz & Boone, 2011). Uniqueness of the proposition The kindergarten will owe its uniqueness two its curriculum and teachers. As far as the curriculum is concerned, the kindergarten will strive to ensure it has a varied curriculum offering hands-on-experience and achievable challenges to the children. This varied curriculum will also be designed in such a way that it becomes balance promotes a deeper absorption of knowledge and information. In this regard, the children, through the curriculum will be exposed to a wide range of experiences like movement and music, physical play, nature study, computer, cooking, art and craft. Through this exposure, the child enrolled to the kindergarten will slowly begin to know that the world is much larger and diverse than they imagine! In a nut shell, the curriculum in the kindergarten is well designed to open up and widen the mind and view of the child as far as the world is concerned. It is a curriculum that any parent cannot afford stopping his or her child from accessing and being molded by it. Apart from the wonderful curriculum, another unique feature of the kindergarten will be the teachers. Kiddie Junction Kindergarten will hire teachers who understand that the kids need the chance to be kids. In this case, all the teachers will have as much fun as possible with the kids. This means they will all be laughing together and learning through playing together. What a wonderful experience for the kids and the society as whole to behold! The educators in charge of the early years kids will make use of every window of opportunity in offering the kids a specific lesson at a time. These educators will be encouraged not to rush to avoid the little kid missing the point or losing the lesson. By so doing, the independence of the child will be highly promoted. Another unique aspect of the kindergarten is its recognition of the special needs of some families. In this case, the kindergarten will provide specialist assistance for families who have school aged kids having learning obstacles. One of the special needs that will be addressed is that in which a child show a lack of confidence or self-esteem. The other need is that in which behavior issues are affecting the learning process of the child. Last, the school will seek to address the special need in which a child finds it hard to sit still and concentrate in the completion of homework or in the classroom work. This will be achieved by hiring a trained neuro-educator that has expertise on the correlation of sensory integration, early movement and later learning. The idea to come up with this provision was necessitated by the fact that the incidence of Spectrum disorders, Dyslexia, ADHD, and Sensory Processing disorder has been on the increase especially among essentially bright kids. For a long time, many professionals and educators handling this field have been reluctant to get deeper into the relationship of these neuro physiological obstacles and their impact on learning in a school aged kid. There is a predictable feature of development that all children need to follow. There should be exploration of the relationship between learning and movement. Therefore, brain exercise routines need to be incorporated into the classroom setting. These services, therefore, among others, which offer assistance to parents whose children have special needs, will be offered in the kindergarten. Apart from offering assistance to families whose kids have special needs, the kindergarten will earn its uniqueness from the adoption of appropriate technologies and media. Conventionally, finger paint and wooden blocks are great as far as the learning of such kindergarten concepts as colors, sizes, shapes and numbers is concerned. However, as the kids grow older they need and want to work on projects that are more advanced. They also have the desire of learning concepts that are more advanced. In order to accomplish this they need diverse materials, media and tools. This will therefore, compel Kiddie Junction School to incorporate digital technologies into its system. If these technologies are designed and used properly, they can extend the approach and scope of the kindergarten. This will make the kids grow as creative thinkers all the time. Appeal to the Society and consumers With this high number of potential customers present within the locality, the action plan for making the kindergarten appealing to them is going to involve creativity. First, the outlook of the kindergarten will need to be appealing to the society and consumers. In this case, the kindergarten facility will be fenced using a concrete wall. On the front side of the wall, a very long train heading to the gate is going to be drawn. The train will be painted colorfully so that it becomes attractive to the eyes of the children and the parents. At the head of the train next to the gate, two children, a boy and a girl are drawn. The children are drawn in such a way that they are waving the train as they try to enter into the gate. On the backs of the two children will be school bags. Written besides the long train will be the alphabetical letters from A to Z and the numbers from 1 to 10. At the tail of the train, it will be indicated, “Welcome to Kiddie junction.” When the parents look at the colorful designs and creativity at the wall, they will be interested to find more about the kindergarten (Kowalski, 2002). Because of this it will be easy to market the kindergarten. Also, when the children also see the colorful pictures, they will want to go and find out more. They will in fact ask their parents to take them there. In the process, the market for the kindergarten will grow faster because the facility has become appealing to the society. As far as the matters of hygiene and environment are concerned, everything is supposed to be neatly arranged always so that when the customers visit the school, they just feel like staying longer. The educators will adopt the culture of being welcoming to not only to the children but also to the visitors. Every visitor needs to be accorded dew attention. In this way, the school will appeal to the society by a great deal (Pianta, Cox & Snow, 2007). The unique service of talent identification and development, which is hardly available in the nearby schools, is also going to be one of the ways of making the kindergarten appealing to the society and the consumers. The kindergarten will serve the customers impartially. This means there will be no form of discrimination and corruption as far as service delivery is concerned. Those parents or children with problems will be listened to and helped accordingly. Those children with special learning needs will also be assisted accordingly. In the end, the both the physical atmosphere of the kindergarten and the social atmosphere will be very appealing to the society. Main Products/Services Apart from offering the basic products/services offered by most of the kindergartens, the Kiddie Junction School will go an extra mile to offer some other unique and creative services. Therefore, the basic services are going to include: transport of children from and to their homes, sleep break, meal serving, and education (Hawkins & Hawkins, 2002). Specifically, the children are equipped with such services as Math Readiness, Reading Readiness, science and social studies, social skills. They also have access to such areas as art and craft centers, computer station, puppet play room, puzzles and toy shelf, paint easel, so that they can supplement their classroom work with the practical work. Paint Easel Art and Craft With these services, children will have the chance to play, learn and grow together. The image below is one of the pictures that will be placed in the school to guide the objectives of the kindergarten. Picture 1: an example of the pictures that will guide the objectives of the kindergarten Consequently, one of the most creative and most important services offered at the Kiddie Junction School is the service of talent identification and development. Most of the kindergartens ignore this service yet it is one of the most important for the children. That is why most people live until they have completed their high school so that they discover their talents. At this point, they may have little time to build the very talent. Therefore, this problem is amicably addressed at the Kiddie Junction School by the unique service of talent identification and development. In order to accomplish this service, the school has special sessions after classroom work during which the children are left with a specialized psychologist hired to monitor them and align their preferences to specific areas of talent development. Once the talents for the children have been identified, they are recorded so that the parents are advised accordingly on how they can help in the development of the same. Among the areas where talents are identified in the kindergarten include sports, music, art, craft, and comedy, painting and designing. Picture 2: showing talent identification service Feasibility Study In the executive summary, it was mentioned that the majority of the dwellers in this city is top class. In this case, the kindergarten will address the top class consisting of the high-class district, teachers, physicians, engineers and IT engineers, accounting experts and managers. In a situation whereby our level of investment limit the kindergarten from offering some top quality services, the kindergarten will resort to addressing this to a proper segment. Therefore, this does not mean compromising or reducing the quality. Instead, it means including fewer services but retaining the high quality of the remaining services. For instance, in the absence of enough resources for acquiring a car, the kindergarten shall not offer the service of transport to the residence kids. Therefore, as far as the customers of the kindergarten and the quality of service are concerned, the price policy should be implemented in such a way that a lower price is not set. This is because this action will create the feeling of low or poor quality service. By setting a higher price, the customers will presume or will have the impression those diverse services, which are of high quality, are offered at the kindergarten (Hawkins & Hawkins, 2002). The kindergarten will be located next to the military base At Dubai. Around this region, residential real estates are growing at an alarming rate. This growth is attributed to various factors. One of the factors is the proximity of the place to the security organs. The fact that there is a military unit around assures people of security and therefore, these lures investors to come and put up residential real estates. The second factor is the proximity to the central business district of Dubai city. There are well maintained roads that connect this identified location with the Dubai’s central business district. This has compelled the top class people to secure their residence in the place. The third factor is the serene environment with well maintained drainage and sewerage system. The place is so conducive for living that investors have been forced to erect tall rental houses (OECD, 2001). On the other hand, few investors have thought of coming up with a kindergarten. In any case, there are only primary grade schools, high schools, tertiary institutions and higher levels of education. In the outskirt of this growing estate, lies the proposed location of the kindergarten. Between the residences and the proposed location, there are clear road networks. Therefore, children from the estate can easily find access to the kindergarten without encountering any challenges. In terms of geographical conditions, the location befits the project in that it has a gently rolling ground with a level ground, which can serve as a playing ground. The gently sloping nature of the site also ensures that excess water is drained so that it does not accumulate and compromise the hygiene or the operations at the Kindergarten (Kurtz & Boone, 2011). The specific competitors of the Kiddie Junction School are the Rising Star Primary School, Sparkle Primary School and Dubai Junior Primary school. Each of these competitors has almost an equal market share. This is because their enrollment is almost the same for each of the schools. The cause of this same enrollment is the performance parity and the distanced proximity between the schools. The market of these day primary schools comes mainly from the middle class and the low class. This is because the charges in these schools are relatively low compared with those of the proposed kindergarten. While these low charges are a source of competitive advantage, they are also a blessing in disguise to the proposed kindergarten. This is because the top class and most people normally associate high charges with quality services and service diversity, which characterize the proposed kindergarten. Besides, the rich class wants to put their children in the available expensive education since they know that there is where the children will receive maximum attention that befits them. Therefore, with the pricing strategy involving setting high prices in the kindergarten, and low prices for the primary schools, each competitor will have a competitive advantage in terms of the target market. Consequently, the lowly paid class is the target market for the competitors of the kindergarten. In order to bring their customers, the cost of education is low. On the other hand, the expensive education offered at the kindergartens is the pride of the rich and the affluent (Roueche & Jones, 2005). Supply chain and partners The kindergarten project being mainly a service based idea, the supply chain is going to be shorter. Few parties are going to be involved in the service delivery. Consequently, the service delivery starts from the transportation of children from their homes to school. The transportation is in the hands of a professional driver. At school, the next service for the children is education. This service is offered by the qualified educators. After the education, qualified caretakers take the children to the field to play, serve them their meals and offer sleep break facilities those who need them. Finally, the psychologist administers the test to ascertain the proper development of the children (Kowalski, 2002). In order to accomplish all these services, the kindergarten will partner with some people and organizations. Among these partners are religious institutions, catering organizations, government bodies like the Early Childhood Development organizations, non-governmental organizations and sponsors. SWOT ANALYSIS Short SWOT analysis the kindergarten is as shown in the table below: Strengths Weaknesses • The first strength of the kindergarten is that it will be in the capacity of addressing the great need of the young majority population who are not only better paid, but also opened to the new idea and willing to pay for the services. • Secondly, operating as a business falling under the services field, the kindergarten will have its level or amount of fixed expenses reduced. Thirdly, the largest investment of the kindergarten project shall be the human resource. This human capital can in no way be imitated, implying that it will be in a position to withstand competition at a more financially endowed position. The single weakness of the kindergarten is that it has no provision for anyone to implement it. Instead, it demands that the implementers be equipped with a great deal of pedagogical training. OPPORTUNITIES Threats • With the kindergarten project or facility in place, it will become more possible and easy to access the programs needed for training and imparting skills to educators. This is because the facility will bring up the need to have an institution nearby to train the educators • In addition, bringing the facility closer to the people will change the mentality of most of the people. In this case, people will become more aware of the importance of education. The same people will also develop an interest in investing in a better and quality education for their kids. The main threat of the kindergarten project lies in the legal regulations. In this case, there are strict legal requirements for establishing such a project. at the same time, these legal regulations shall become even sharper in the long run. Legal Obligations There are a number of legal obligations that the kindergarten project will be obliged to comply with. These obligations include the compliance with the education act. Under this act, the kindergarten will have to comply with the rules set for admission to government schools, special religious education, register of attendances and enrolments, discipline in government schools and objection to religious education. The next act that the kindergarten needs to comply with is the teaching services act. In addition, the kindergarten will have to comply with education teaching service regulation. Under this, the kindergarten is expected to do such things as disclosure of information, management of schools, scope of duties, medical examination, serious crimes that the Members of staff commit, compliance with directions and with the statutory conditions of service. The kindergarten will be also be expected to comply with the care and protection act for children and young persons , anti-discrimination act, crimes act, freedom of information act, occupational health and safety act, child protection act, public finance and audit act, personal information and privacy protection act (OECD, 2001). Growth strategy The proposed growth strategy of the kindergarten is that it will start by extending into the primary boarding school classes. This strategy will be meant to ensure that the children who are molded at the kindergarten do not have hard time looking for other primary schools nearby to further their education. This strategy is also important because once the children in the kindergarten have gotten used to the particular environment, it is not healthy to take them to a different environment. Instead, they will do well if they continue their education in the same environment. This expansion will mean acquisition of more land or building so that classrooms and offices may be created. Apart from expansion of classrooms, the kindergarten is also planned to grow by creating an early childhood development training college. This growth strategy will work in the sense that there is no other nearby colleges of this kind. Besides, the training of the ECD teachers will be scheduled to be taking place during school holidays when the children are at home. These growth strategies involve taking risks but once they will be established, the returns are going to be very promising (Kurtz & Boone, 2011). Cost information and balance sheet The kindergarten project requires a great deal of operating costs for it to function in accordance with the proposed functionality. The analysis of the operating costs requires one to understand the managerial, economic and technological aspects of the project. Therefore, one needs to understand the project’s technical flow, implying that he or she understands the infrastructure of required utilities, the number of workers to be employed as well as the structure that these employees will be put in. Therefore, different kinds of costs are not going to be omitted as far as the financial analysis of the kindergarten project is concerned. These costs can be categorized into different classes for clarity purposes. The first category of the costs constitutes the costs needed for establishing the kindergarten. Under this category are the cost for authorizations of the project’s documents and the costs of incorporating the kindergarten into the trade registry (Kowalski, 2002). The second category of costs constitutes the current costs. This category brings together the education and personnel training costs, local taxes and charges, auxiliary materials, consumables, raw materials, bonuses, premiums, management wages and personnel costs like social and wage costs, costs for external services like public relations consulting, IT consulting, consulting management, legal assistance, financial consulting, and accounting. The third category of costs constitutes the cost that is related to space. Under this category, there are costs for storage space, playing ground or space for children, space for the kitchen and eating room, and space for classrooms (Roueche & Jones, 2005). The other costs include the expenses related to waste, water/sewer, insurance, repairs, cleaning, current, gas and heating. There are also the maintenance costs, costs of repairs and costs of equipments.the fourth category of costs constitute the costs of transportations. This brings together the taxes, civil liability insurance, repairs and maintenance, revision and fuel costs. Last, is the category of administrative costs. This brings together the costs of specialty literature, costs of such subscriptions as legislation, office equipment maintenance and magazines subscription, costs for calculation of wages and primary recording, communications costs through e-mails, mobile, fax and phone, office materials and business travels (Kurtz & Boone, 2011). The investment costs will include the costs for acquiring cars, equipment, buildings as well as other capital assets. Connected to the investment costs are such costs as rehabilitation, arrangments, access roads, sewearage, current/gas/water chages, infrastructure. There are other costs, whcih include the expenses for the activities or events organized for initial business promotion, training expenses , management or administration of the project’s expenses (Kowalski, 2002). Financial forecasts In this case, the financial forecasts refer to the planning or anticipation of the financial performance of the business project in the future. The forecasts bring together such future mathematical modeling as the cash-flow statement calculation, profit and loss account modeling and balance sheet statement modeling. In this case, the paper shall focus on the balance sheet statement. Balance Sheet of the Kindergarten project as at 31st December 2013 Current Assets 2014 2013 Cash and Cash Equivalents 1,528,000 1,269,000 Prepayments 10,000 17,000 Trade and other receivables 97,000 81,000 Total Current Assets 1,635,000 1,367,000 Non-Current Assets Equipment, plant, property 58,000 78,000 Total Non-current assets 58,000 78,000 Total Assets 1,693,000 1,445,000 Current Liabilities Provisions 86,000 74,000 Trade and other payables 807,000 681,000 Total Current liabilities 893,000 755,000 Non-current liabilities Provisions 54,000 42,000 Total non-Current liabilities 54,000 42,000 Total Liabilities 947000 797000 NET ASSETS 800,000 648,000 Equity Accumulated funds 800,000 648,000 Risk and Exit Strategy As far as risk is concerned in this venture, it will be important to know the amount of risk that can be taken. This is because risk is a vital factor as far as this investment is concerned. Therefore, the risk level will be determined. This will make it possible to determine the amount of lose that can be afforded in the venture. After determining this amount of loss, the length of the business can now be determined. At the same time the determination of type of stop-loss to be used can now be possible. In this case, tighter stops will be set if less risks are wanted. On the other hand, those who want more generous returns will assume more risks. Therefore, in the case of the Kiddie Junction School, the stop-loss points will be set to avoid the normal market volatility setting the points. In the exit strategy, the venture will not exit by setting a take-profit point. This is because the strategy may involve selling the business even when it is performing well. if this move is made, then considerable losses can be made. Considering the uniqueness and creativity employed in the kindergarten, this exit strategy is not good. This venture being a long-term investment, the exit point is going to be set at a critical price level, which is based on the yearly target of the kindergarten. References Hawkins, D., & Hawkins, D. (2002). Flambeau: version 2.0. Grand Rapids, MI, Kregel Publications. Kowalski, T. J. (2002). Planning and managing school facilities. Westport, Conn, Bergin & Garvey. Kurtz, D. L., & Boone, L. E. (2011). Contemporary business. Hoboken, N.J., Wiley. OECD (2001). Putting the young in business: policy challenges for youth entrepreneurship. Paris, OECD Publ. Pianta, R. C., Cox, M. J., & Snow, K. L. (2007). School readiness and the transition to kindergarten in the era of accountability. Baltimore, Md, Paul H. Brookes Publishing. Roueche, J. E., & Jones, B. R. (2005). The entrepreneurial community college. Washington, D.C., Community College Press. Read More