by Reeham Choudhury
Collaborating students. Hands-off teachers. Projects with a tangible endpoint. These are everyday occurrences in a new class that is listed under both Career and Technology Education and English in the student handbook.
In Communications for Entrepreneurs, students work in teams and use their knowledge to create for-profit and non-profit organizations in order to help the community.
According to English teacher Elon Fischer, one of the co-teachers, students in the project-based class work in teams to turn an idea into a business.
“We’re modeling it after how people in the real world, who work as entrepreneurs, work,” Fischer said. “We set it up so it’s less of a class and more of a firm.”
Business teacher Brittany Stevens, the other teacher of the class, said that Communications for Entrepreneurs was created to give students an opportunity to do real work during their school day.
“It’s really our guiding their learning about business and professional education while they are doing work that matters to them in some way,” Stevens said.
Students emulate the work of real entrepreneurs to put their various ideas into action. Students are currently working on projects such as environmentally friendly sneakers, a portable cell phone charger, and a system to familiarize less experienced parents with colleges and the SAT.
Senior Gavin Hui said that he joined the class to begin working towards his goal of starting his own organization.
“I felt that in the future, I would start my own non-profit,” Hui said. “So entrepreneurship would help me get the skills that would make me capable of starting my own non-profit.”
Hui said that he has found the class illuminating so far.
“It’s been a really eye-opening experience,” Hui said. “We’ve gotten to meet with a lot of people who have started their own businesses.”
Senior Shriya Rathi said she particularly liked the set up of the class in that each team of students
takes on the role of a company, and each student has a position in that company.
“You have to work together to create a business or work with another business to solve a problem,” Rathi said.
From the students’ reactions to the class so far, Fischer and Stevens believe that this class will be successful in the future, especially for particular types of students.
“It’s not like regular school classes,” Stevens said. “So if students are frustrated doing projects for the sake of projects, then this would be a class for them to do work that is one, in their control and two, to fruition.”
According to Fischer, this class is for students who are ready to drive their own education and are looking for opportunities to do what they want.
Rathi said that this freedom emphasized the connection between the class and the real world, which has been very beneficial.
“In a lot of our other classes we don’t get that real-world experience, and in this class, I do get that real-world experience by going out and talking to people and not just staying in the classroom and studying for a test,” Rathi said. “I think the fact that we get this experience in high school is really great.”
Reeham Choudhury can be contacted at [email protected]
