British Council's Creative Spark Higher Education Enterprise Programme is a five-year initiative to develop creative economy and drive enterprise skills across seven countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan via UK university and institutional partnerships

The Creative Spark programme is designed to support the creative economy in Central Asia, the South Caucasus and Ukraine.This is a response to an underdeveloped creative sector in these countries which limits opportunities for young people. In addition, a skills gap exists which restricts young people’s access to international networks, markets and resources. 

The program aims to provide participants with key skills through funded international partnerships between higher education and creative institutions in the UK and the equivalents in the selected seven programme countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. This will help to drive enterprise and entrepreneurship skills training, and supports the development of the creative economy. Creative Spark will also support higher education reform and help to reduce unemployment rates across all countries involved.

 Three main interventions of this program:

1. Development of partnerships involving universities and creative institutions in the UK and those in program countries in order to drive enterprise training in those seven partner countries including the establishment of enterprise centres
2. Delivering enterprise skills training packages to students and creative entrepreneurs, ranging from pitching ideas and starting a business, to protecting intellectual property and securing financial support
3. Delivering an English learning programme with a range of new digital English language learning content including digital learning platforms, online courses and new Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) courses focused on English for entrepreneurship.

The programme primary beneficiaries are university students, graduates and young entrepreneurs, as well as the actual institutions including universities, ministries, cultural institutions, enterprise agencies, creative hubs, business incubation and enterprise centres, and similar organisations supporting creative enterprise.

In the longer term, British Council plans for this programme to contribute to a more prosperous region through the support of UK expertise in education innovation and cultural partnerships.