The Academy of Business program was a busy place this week. The PM students were joined by eight volunteer members of the Seacoast Chapter of SCORE who came in to provide guidance and prospective to the students in the focus area of Entrepreneurship. For this component, each student’s culminating project is creating their own business plan of their choice. The students started on their plans right out of the gate in September and will wrap it up at the end of April. This week they were placed in four different groups and rotated through 15-minute roundtable discussions where they received 1:1 advice with a mentor. This was followed by some time for the students to make note of the changes that they will make to their plans with their mentors. Topics included: Making Financial Projections, Why Register an LLC, Mistakes and Needs as well as Plan Evaluation. Students were provided with valuable feedback as to how viable their plans are and were given pointers of where they could make adjustments. It was a successful meeting for both the students and mentors. The mentors shared with Ms. Lamoreau, the program instructor, that most of the plans were far in advance of some of their adult clients and commended the students on the work they had put in. SCORE will be returning next month to see their updated plans and hear the students’ live elevator pitches for their business plans as they are getting closer to completion
The AM Academy of Business students have been working with a mentor from Junior Achievement in preparation for the Titan Challenge that is coming up on April 4. The Titan Challenge is a business strategy competition for high school students where teams of students work to guide a fledgling company through the ups and downs of the market. Mr. Bourret, who has been mentoring the students in the Academy of Business for over ten years, will come into class and run various scenarios by the student, providing them advice on some of their business decisions as practice for the competition.
This is just a glimpse into the Academy of Business program where students who successfully complete the two year program can earn up to 15 college credits before they even graduate high school.