.floatimg-left-hort { float:left; } .floatimg-left-caption-hort { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:300px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-vert { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right:15px; width:200px;} .floatimg-left-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; font-size: 12px; width:200px;} .floatimg-right-hort { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px;} .floatimg-right-caption-hort { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px; font-size: 12px; } .floatimg-right-vert { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px;} .floatimg-right-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; font-size: 12px; } .floatimgright-sidebar { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; border-top-style: double; border-top-color: black; border-bottom-style: double; border-bottom-color: black;} .floatimgright-sidebar p { line-height: 115%; text-indent: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar h4 { font-variant:small-caps; } .pullquote { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 150px; background: url(http://www.dmbusinessdaily.com/DAILY/editorial/extras/closequote.gif) no-repeat bottom right !important ; line-height: 150%; font-size: 125%; border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} .floatvidleft { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatvidright { float:right; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;}
They all met just five days earlier.

Now, as they stood in a tight circle on a sun-drenched brick walkway on the Simpson College campus in Indianola, a dozen high school students from across the state laughed and joked as they tossed a ball of green-and-white yarn to each other as part of a team-building exercise, taking turns sharing what they had learned during the week.

“I learned that business can be fun,” one student said.

“I learned about working with different people,” said another. “Mainly in school you work with the same people.”

“I learned to step outside my comfort zone,” a third said.

Later that day, the group – known for the week as Industry D – set up a trade show booth inside the campus gym to show off their product, EcoSled, to prospective investors (many of whom looked a lot like their parents). It capped off a week living on campus, listening to presentations by local businesspeople such as Abe Goldstein, visiting companies like Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc. and social events that included learning which fork to use first during a formal business dinner.

The students were among nearly 100 Iowa teen-agers who took part in Business Horizons 2008 last month. In its 25th year, the weeklong program run by the Iowa Association of Business and Industry Foundation is designed to promote entrepreneurial thinking and develop leadership skills among high school students.

Seeking partners

Though sports, music and other activity-related summer camps likely still outnumber business and entrepreneurial camps in Iowa, opportunities for students to learn about business continue to increase.

The week after Business Horizons, for instance, a group of 25 middle school students gathered at the Pappajohn Education Center in Des Moines to take part in the Jacobson Entrepreneurship Academy. The weeklong business day camp is hosted by the Jacobson Institute for Youth Entrepreneurship, which is located at the University of Iowa.

“If you expose kids at a young age, if you get them actively involved in running a small business while they’re young, by the time they’re 25 or 30 and a bigger opportunity comes along for them, they’ll have the confidence to take that opportunity,” said Dawn Bowlus, the institute’s director.

The Jacobson Institute conducted its first camp in Iowa City in 1996, and four years ago began offering the curriculum in Des Moines as well. This summer, the institute expanded the camp to Spencer, in conjunction with Iowa Lakes Corridor Development Corp., and is looking to expand to Council Bluffs and Sioux City next summer.

“We’re looking for partners in locations all over the state,” Bowlus said, “so rather than impacting 85 students (this summer’s enrollment figure), we can have literally hundreds.”

Stay in Iowa

Encouraging students to consider staying in Iowa – or to return after college – to start their own business or a career is a big part of Business Horizons week, said David Williamson, an artist who has spoken to Business Horizon classes for about the past 15 years.

“In 30 years of being a visiting artist (at Iowa schools), I’ve never met a kid yet who said, ‘I’m not creative.'” he said. “But by the time we’re in high school, some of us are doubting that we’re creative. My contribution to Business Horizons is making sure that by the end of the week, they understand they’re a high-performance creative entity and they can create and add value in any economy, so why not do it here?”

Austin Moody, who will be a senior at Ballard High School in Huxley this fall, said he plans to stay in Iowa and major in financial management at the University of Northern Iowa. He hopes to start out working for a big financial services company and later open his own business. A member of the Industry D team, Moody served as president of the team’s company, which they named GoEco.

“I had plans to go Kansas City after college,” Moody said at the end of the week. “Now, I’m leaning toward not leaving the state at all. So I think they did a pretty good job (of selling Iowa).”

At the beginning of the week, each of the eight Business Horizon teams were put in a room with assorted garage-sale-grade junk and were given 15 minutes to decide upon a product they could build and effectively market during the week.

“The most challenging thing was that we were just thrown into it,” said Amelia Wilson, another Industry D member, who graduated in May from Boone High School. “We weren’t given a rubric like in school. So we just had to figure out things as they came.” Wilson has been accepted at the University of Pennsylvania, where she will go after working for a year as an AmeriCorps volunteer in Los Angeles.

The week also exposed the students to business people, many of whom take the entire week off to serve as advisers.

“I always get energized by this week,” said Jenny Grandgeorge, an education coordinator with Mercy Medical Center who has volunteered at Business Horizons for the past seven years. “It’s very energizing to work with these students; this is what the future holds,” she said.

A focus group conducted with the students during the week indicated they would like to have more exposure to human resource representatives during the week, said Wade Den Hartog, development director of the ABI Foundation.

“We were pleasantly surprised to hear they wanted to know more about careers out there,” he said.

‘I could do this’

Though the Jacobson camps take a similar approach in guiding students in developing a business plan, they also emphasize businesses that middle-school students can actually start, Bowlus said.

“At the very beginning of the week, when they’re just coming in with their ideas, they might think, ‘This might be possible,'” she said. “”But by the end of the week, if they’ve chosen a good idea, one that’s viable, by Thursday afternoon, the light bulb goes on for a lot of the students and they say, ‘Wow, I could really do this and make money doing this.’ And they’re just at the right age where they want to have some money of their own.”

At the end of the week, the students, who worked individually on their businesses, came up with concepts that included a logo business, an interior decorating business and an online enterprise to help aspiring musicians connect to form bands.

John Rigler, president of Security State Bank in New Hampton, was among the volunteers who judged the business plans, with the top three plans receiving cash prizes of $100, $75 and $50.

“I look at how thoroughly they’ve thought through it, what sort of contingency planning they’ve done and whether someone else is already doing this type of business,” Rigler said. “It’s just a whole lot of fun.”

Jacob Bernholtz, who will be going into the eighth grade at Ballard in Huxley, put together a plan for Hot Shots, a business in which he plans to photograph student athletes during their games to sell to their families.

“I’m targeting parents who would like photos of their kids while they are playing sports,” he said “It’s something that no one else is doing in Huxley.” He came up with the idea after attending a friend’s basketball game and seeing someone taking photos to sell. “But they were charging a lot,” Bernholtz said. “I thought I could do it at a lower cost.”