CARTHAGE, Mo. — In order to survive the business world in America, an understanding of the enterprise system is critical. Carthage High School’s Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) chapter believes that it is important to teach kids about the business world, so they visited the Carthage Intermediate Center. The FBLA Leadership Team planned a three-day project for local fourth grade students. According to the local FBLA chapter President, Aubrie Fewin, “American enterprise teaches the kids important concepts that they will use for the rest of their lives… hopefully. It gives them an interest in business early on.”
There are currently sixteen fourth grade classes at the Carthage Intermediate Center. The Carthage FBLA Chapter decided on picking two classes this year for this project. The FBLA members were split into two groups. One group was in charge of teaching marketing techniques in Mrs. Cochran’s class while the other group taught students how to make smart investments in Ms. Catron’s class.
After the lessons were taught, each group got started with their activities right away. The marketing class was split into groups of five and each had a leader from the FBLA chapter. They quickly chose a project to create and market. The projects included balloon paddleboards, catapults, mini lava lamps, and friendship bracelets.
While the marketing classes were creating their products, the buying classes were playing a monopoly game that Tyler Burt and Sophie Shannon reinvigorated. This game taught the students how to make smart investments and create a budget. On the final day, the two classes merged together and the marketing classes sold their products to the investing classes in the “market”. This taught the marketing classes how to make a profit and show the investing classes what a smart buy looks like. The goal for the marketing classes was to make the most profit possible.
The winners out of the class were the “Mini Lava Lamps” led by Ashton Lancaster and Cambry Erdman.
As we all know, in 2020 our world was changed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. This added a challenge to our project but as Future Business Leaders of America, we knew we could come up with a solution to keep everyone safe and protected. The Carthage FBLA Chapter made sure to connect with the Carthage Intermediate Center upon arrival to ensure that it was okay for us high school students to be in their building. Once in the building CDC guidelines were followed and masks were implemented and worn by the FBLA students. Social Distancing occurred when possible and proper sanitation measures were also made a priority. Although this pandemic has canceled many of FBLA’s in-person events and has challenged our lives in every aspect, we chose to look towards the brighter side and Carthage FBLA was extremely thankful to be able to do this project with the fourth graders.
The project turned out to be a great success. One of the local FBLA goals was to promote future membership in the chapter. Many of the students said they had plans to join FBLA in the future.
