Our Mission
Brief Cases, an initiative from The Heaven Company, aims to bridge the gap between academic study and commercial reality. The scheme provides real-life learning opportunities for degree level students and scope for Universities to collaborate with industry.
Undergraduates are challenged to work according to the constraints of a business brief in fulfilment of a BA (Hons) degree programme. Through our practical application based projects, students gain valuable entrepreneurial and employability skills, as well as industry awareness. Brief Cases is a national competition, judged and awarded by industry professionals.
Sustainability Solutions
“In an increasingly competitive and complex business environment, Brief Cases tasks participants to research, devise and explain their ideas in a manner that is expected in a commercial context. Our projects offer students a unique opportunity to gain direct connections with industry and to tackle social and sustainability issues while answering the challenges we set within our business briefs.”
— Veronica Heaven, FRSA - Brief Cases Founder
Our Programmes
brief cases: packaging, design and technology
Undergraduate is the longest running Brief Cases level. At undergraduate level, Brief Cases is a semester long taught programme that works with industry partners and reaches up to 1,000 students each year across the UK.
Topics covered are not typically taught in UK universities; yet, through Brief Cases and working with client partners, we encourage students to become problem solvers with a focus on innovation, creativity and sustainability.
Case study: Iggesund Paperboard
For example, over the past five years Iggesund has cooperated with us across several universities in the UK with the aim of enabling design students to get a taste of the reality they will encounter when they enter working life. Together with Brief Cases, Iggesund has produced briefs on topical subjects in the graphics and packaging sectors, which the universities have then integrated into their programmes.
The subjects have varied from “What will tomorrow’s packaging look like?” to “How can we exploit the advantages of digital printing in small-scale packaging production?” but have also included how to produce infographics on sustainability issues or how to describe Iggesund’s Grow Your Income programme to encourage farmers in northern England to start growing energy crops.
Sustainable Development
Brief Cases is an awards scheme for university students working on real-world briefs from prestigious employers and client businesses. As the world’s population grows and markets are internationalised, greater demands are put on the Earth’s natural resources.
Business has a role to play in creating solutions and new ways of working – sustainable procurement, production processes and responsible design methods will be a key component in creating appropriate solutions for the future.
Brief Cases university projects are identified to address skills gaps, business needs and areas where wider sustainability issues are emerging - every Brief Cases project is underpinned by the message of sustainability.
Brief cases: masters LEVEL PATHWAY
Brief Cases has become an embedded pathway within the Post Graduate ‘MA Global Governance and Sustainable Development’ as well as the ‘MSc Sustainability and Environmental Management’ course in association with one of the scheme’s university partners, Middlesex University.
“I am glad to have had the opportunity to work with The Heaven Company to pilot Brief Cases at Middlesex. Offered to our MA Global Governance and Sustainable Development students for the first time this winter, the Brief Cases is providing students with a unique insight into how sustainability, both environmental and social, can be furthered in the business sector and how the UN Sustainable Development Goals can inform business strategy. Our first workshop also demonstrated that students relish this opportunity to think creatively outside the academic remit while also applying the critical understanding of sustainable development issues and solutions that they have so far gained in their degree.”
- Dr. Meri Juntti
SG+YOU (High school level)
The award-winning schools programme piloted at selected schools was developed by The Heaven Company in partnership with Stephen George + Partners, architects and master planners. The 10-week Architecture and Sustainability course is delivered in the classroom as a taught programme within the school time-table and is designed to encourage school aged children to explore the built environment and to learn about sustainability.
The structured approach that the programme provides can be mapped to the Careers Strategy guidance and Gatsby benchmarks and includes:
Lesson plans with defined outcomes that link to science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM subjects) and the Arts - linking curriculum learning to careers
Workbooks are provided to each student to record their work and capture real-life learning experiences derived from classes held with industry contacts
Certificates are awarded to students to recognise achievement and the successful completion of the course at a special celebration event
Brief Cases university connections provide opportunities for schools to engage with Higher Education.
“We are really pleased to have had the opportunity to work on the Architecture and Sustainability project in collaboration with Stephen George + Partners and Brief Cases,” says Fiona Rogers, Careers Leader at New College Leicester. “The enthusiasm and engagement of our Year 9 students and their research outside of the classroom were reflected in the excellent ideas and mock ups of planet friendly homes built during the sessions. We very much appreciate the commitment from Stephen George + Partners and The Heaven Company.
Universities Include:
University of Gloucestershire
www.glos.ac.uk
University of Salford
www.salford.ac.uk
Staffordshire University
www.staffs.ac.uk
Norwich University of the Arts
http://www.nua.ac.uk
University of the Creative Arts, Espom
www.uca.ac.uk
Ravensbourne University
www.ravensbourne.ac.uk/
De Montfort University, Leicester
www.dmu.ac.uk
Middlesex University
https://www.mdx.ac.uk/
Secondary Schools Include:
St Mary's and St John's CE School
www.smsj.barnet.sch.uk
New College Leicester
https://www.newcollege.leicester.sch.uk/
Royds School Leeds
https://www.roydsschool.org/
The Totteridge Academy
https://www.thetotteridgeacademy.org.uk/
Supporters
Holmen Iggesund
Iggesund-Holmen Group, is a Swedish forest industry group which owns large forest holdings and produces newsprint and sawn timber in addition to paperboard.
Holmen Group, ranked “A List” on the CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project) Climate Performance Leadership Index, uses its own extensive production of renewable energy – in the form of hydro-electric power, wind power and back pressure energy to run its industries.
The company takes a long term view. Its forestry operations’ raw material begins with the planting of a seed which when fully grown is harvested as a crop and supplied to its paperboard mills in Sweden and the UK. Iggesund's sophisticated packaging is used by leading brands such as Chanel, Dior, Bulgari, Veuve-Cliquot and Johnny Walker to name just a few.
Iggesund-Holmen Group supports Brief Cases as part of its commitment to sustainability and helping to strengthen the future talent pool.
Earth Island
Earth Island is media partner to Brief Cases. The organisation publishes a diverse range of magazines across several markets, including leading monthly title: Print Solutions, as well as Packaging Solutions, IndPrint and GreenPrint. The Solutions Awards hosts the Brief Cases Award winners further bringing talent to the attention of industry.