Students learn about starting a business

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With only a few weeks of school to go before graduation, Van Wert City Schools seniors were offered yet another option for their future from Van Wert City Economic Development Director and Ohio State University Extension Community Development Educator Cindy Leis, and Gary Corcoran, a business counselor for Wright State University-Lake Campus’ Business Enterprise Center. The option offered becoming an entrepreneur and owning their own business.

Seniors at Van Wert City Schools are required to take a government class and the class now requires financial literacy as a part of the overall curriculum. The financial literacy portion of the class offers several aspects of personal financing, from car loans to credit cards, but missing in the program was an opportunity that involved owning one’s own business.

Last year, Van Wert High School Principal Bill Clifton was contacted by Leis regarding interest in the opportunity to teach students about starting their own business, either after high school or in their future. Clifton, along with the government teacher Bob Priest and guidance counselors were very excited about the program.

With the program finishing its second year at the high school, both students and teacher were again impressed with the students’ interest and excitement about owning their own business.

“Van Wert High School government students had the good fortune of participating with two universities at the local level for a three-day introduction to entrepreneurship, business planning and financing,” stated Priest. “I was impressed with the ideas the students created for the betterment of Van Wert and then they had to put the numbers to their business plan.

“That was the difficult part,” Priest added. “I think students now have a better understanding of how expensive and time consuming it can be to own a business.”

Over the three-day period, Leis and Corcoran delivered valuable information on starting a business, beginning with an assessment to determine if the students had the characteristics to be their own boss and hearing from a local entrepreneur and business owner of Firehouse Pizza in Middle Point.

Other sessions involved students working in groups selecting a product or service idea they felt was missing in the community and creating a business plan to substantiate their idea. Lastly, the students got the opportunity to understand start-up expenses, on-going operating costs, pricing, and break-even analysis.

The program concluded with a survey given to the students in an effort to evaluate the usefulness and suitability for the students. The survey results indicated that 98 percent of the students felt the program was suitable for graduating seniors and 95 percent recommended Van Wert High School continue to offer the program. Surprisingly, 48 percent of the students responded they would be interested in owning their own business in the future.

“Because of this, I may now think about starting my own business, while I may not have wanted to before,” remarked one of the participating students.