Junior Achievement, in collaboration with Lenawee Now, successfully hosted the CEO Challenge Spark event on January 30 at the LISD TECH Center. This event provided over 50 students with a unique platform to cultivate entrepreneurial skills. High schoolers from across the county gained a greater knowledge of entrepreneurship by hearing from a panel of local entrepreneurs and an opportunity to create and pitch a product idea. Spark is the first stage of a 6-week program designed to help high school students create and pitch business ideas.
CEO Challenge is a multi-phase initiative, designed to allow students to develop entrepreneurship and business skills. During the first phase, known as “Spark,” students explore the fundamentals of entrepreneurship, gaining valuable insights and practical experience. In the “Ignite” phase participants return to their schools, and form teams to develop concepts for a product or service to be presented at “Launch” the culminating pitch competition scheduled for March.
The event began with remarks from Lenawee Now’s Industry Cluster Coordinator, Jack Townsley. Townsley gave an overview of the entrepreneurial process, including the benefits and characteristics of an entrepreneur. Following Townsley’s remarks, participants heard firsthand accounts of entrepreneurship from a panel of successful start-up founders moderated by Meijer’s Ben Negron.
Students gained insights from Jacob Wilson of W4 Entertainment and Josaf Grandados, founder of TEKTON Management, Both entrepreneurs shared their unique journeys into the world of business. Josef’s journey started by transporting his family to construction sites and helping with jobs. He later got a degree, and after working in the corporate world, decided to start his own construction business. Jacob began with a DJ business, swiftly pivoting his focus and expanding into diverse audio and visual mediums after participating in Launch Lenawee. For the past few years, he has been serving as a Launch Lenawee instructor and the audio/visual director for the Adrian Armory.
Students were able to test these concepts on a small scale. Teams comprised of the school districts had one hour to make a product to solve a problem, create a memorable pitch, and mock up a prototype. The idea was left to learners’ ingenuity and the roll of the dice. To define the scope of their project students rolled a die 3 times, each number corresponding to a different product type, the situation where the product was used, and the customer. After several very innovative pitches and much deliberation, the judges chose three winners:
Third place was the PIEWSB, a team from the LISD TECH Center and Addison High School. The Partially Insulated Everyday Work or School Bag was designed for those who have a hard time carrying many things to and from these activities. To illustrate, contestants played out a scenario of a commuter who spilled tea in their bag, which damaged the rest of their items. In contrast, her friend with the PIEWSB, had her items intact and organized, with the stylish durable bag.
The second-place winner, FHB, was a nutritional supplement designed for parents. Contestants from Adrian High School shared how being a parent can be exhausting. For their solution, they proposed FHB as it had many essential nutrients, giving a parent energy to keep up with their progeny’s activities.
The day’s overall winner was a team from Blissfield High School with SeniorCitizens.jobs.org. This is a job site for senior citizens who still felt like they had more to offer and yet didn’t know about opportunities to connect to fulfilling employment. The website would help seniors become aware of suitable vocational options and secure a job. As an added benefit for the elderly, there was also a helpline, staffed by other senior citizens, as they would know the specific struggles that these advanced-aged job seekers were going through.
Overall, the day was highly successful in helping the next generation learn about entrepreneurship and related opportunities. According to Jack Townsley, “Students from across Lenawee County learned about what it takes to be an entrepreneur and possibly start their own business someday. Today, with all the opportunities available in the “Gig Economy” there has never been a better time to become an entrepreneur. We hope to see these students back in March where they will have a chance to pitch their ideas for innovative products or services to a panel of experts and possibly walk away with seed money to implement their dreams.”