case statements

Richard, Student

Richard is a sophomore at Northridge High School. He signed up for a class in entrepreneurship to learn how to start his own business. Throughout the first semester he was excited about the prospect of building his own company but couldn’t seem to find the right company to start. Richard met with a YEA volunteer after one of the many class visits and talked about the type of business he wanted to start. The volunteer, an entrepreneur himself, suggested a few business ideas he could try if he was serious about the endeavor. Within the month Richard had written his rough draft of his business plan and with additional advice from YEA mentor program, started his own business in January. Rather than spending Christmas break looking for a part-time job, Richard was able to start his own company, develop his marketing plan, and submit a complete business plan to the YEA Business Plan Competition where he hopes to earn enough money to launch a three-month marketing campaign and grow his already profitable customer base.

 

Joyce Mathie, Local Entrepreneur

Joyce Mathie has run her own startup for the past five years. Recently, during a YEA sponsored interview for “The Entrepreneurial Life” she discussed her interests in a business spinoff that might make sense for a student-run company. Several weeks later a YEA volunteer mentioned the opportunity to Layne, a sophomore in a local high school. After exchanging several e-mail and telephone calls with Layne YEA set up a meeting between Joyce and Layne. By the end of the meeting the two had agreed on a supplier arrangement and Layne was heading home with a $1,500 piece of equipment that began his new venture in cleaning services. Mrs. Mathie had been able to extend her business reach into a new and interesting market and Layne leveraged his YEA resources to build not only an entire business plan, but also a partner relationship that would help him grow his new business from concept to customer in less than a month. His current growth pattern suggests that his new startup will not only pay him well above a minimum wage job, but should bring in $8,000 in profits in his first full year of operations. Layne has submitted his business in the YEA Young Entrepreneur of the Year competition and is eagerly awaiting the announcement of the winner in the April Young Entrepreneur Summit.

 

Craig Stauffer, Entrepreneur Teacher, Hunter High School

Craig Stauffer has been teaching business courses for over a decade. After trying unsuccessfully to cram a module on entrepreneurship into a marketing class he decided that he needed to do all or nothing and has been teaching a course dedicated to entrepreneurship for the past three years. Like most teachers who offer a course in entrepreneurship, Mr. Stauffer’s schedule is packed. In addition to teaching the course in entrepreneurship he teaches four sections of Marketing, two sections of Sports Marketing, and a course in Personal Finance. In addition, Mr. Stauffer is Hunter High’s FBLA advisor and also serves as the school’s wrestling coach. YEA resources and volunteers provide a small amount of relief to an incredibly overworked teacher. In addition to the magnitude of preparation it takes to offer a full semester course, YEA provides the school with a helpful framework for structuring the class. Mr. Stauffer can download course curriculum, individual lessons, exercises and group activities on specific topics and provide the class with helpful real-life articles based on the experiences of local entrepreneurs. “Developing the curriculum and teaching entrepreneurism was a huge drain of resources for me. It covers so many different areas and there were very few resources to leverage in getting started. Having YEA bring in local entrepreneurs with real experience in the field not only provides a tremendous amount of worthwhile information for my class, but the presenters bring a very necessary degree of enthusiasm about their field that the students become fully engaged in the topics and stories they share. I can’t imagine teaching a course in entrepreneurism without the benefits of YEA.

 

Wade Jensen, YEA Volunteer

Wade Jensen spends most of his time developing IT storage solutions for his customers. A long-time entrepreneur currently on his fourth startup, Mr. Jensen was looking for an opportunity to break out of his daily routine and leverage his experience to give back to his community. He met another YEA volunteer during a monthly networking meeting and found a perfect solution. “YEA provides a great opportunity for me to escape the daily routine and provide direction to kids at the same age of when I started my first business. It is amazing to see the same eagerness and entrepreneurial spirit in a new generation of students. I’m very glad I can take a few hours a month to provide support for such a great program and help kids get started on their own path. The energy I take away from the classroom keeps my spirits soaring for the rest of the week…Things would have been so much better for me if I would have been able to take advantage of such a great program when I was still in school.”