ESTEVAN - Look out for JA and ECS logos in local businesses this holiday season, because the students at the Estevan Comprehensive School have started their yearly small business.
This year’s product? Lip chap going by the name of Get Chapped.
“It’s a three-ingredient homemade lip chap,” said Chelsey Dreidger, the teacher of the Entrepreneurship 30 class. “Those ingredients are coconut oil, soy wax and scented oils, and the five scents that we have this year are bubble gum, cinnamon spice, candy cane, pina colada and a raspberry flavoured one.”
Although Driedger is new to the school, the program is not. The Entrepreneurship 30 class has been at the ECS for a number of years, with the class held in one of the two semesters.
“It’s a class that talks about what it takes to be an entrepreneur,” Dreidger said. “Earlier in the year, the students had to interview local entrepreneurs and kind of figure out what they thought it takes to be an entrepreneur. They’ve written some papers on different things, they created their own business plans, as well as doing a full-fledged business plan as a group.”
She goes on to say that it was a class decision to sell lip chap, and that all of her students pitched different ideas, before they decided on the one they deemed most likely to succeed.
“As a class, we all voted on the one that we thought had the best potential, and that was the business of the lip chap,” Driedger says. “We’ve already started selling it, actually. It’s available at the high school during the noon hour from 1-1:15, and in the mornings from 8:45-9, right before school starts in the front foyer.
“They’ve also reached out to 12 local businesses that have agreed to sell on their behalf. So, throughout the Christmas season, while the students are on holidays, they’ve got 12 businesses lined up who are going to have their product.”
The Get Chapped business is managed and controlled by the students of the Entrepreneurship 30 class, which is for students in Grades 11 and 12.
“The funds actually get split between us,” Dreidger explained. “We hold a shareholder meeting; they all have to purchase shares in the company, so we do it that way. They can split the profits at the end.”
The entrepreneurship class is a program offered by other schools, not just ECS, like some schools in Regina and Weyburn.
“It’s through an organisation called Junior Achievement Canada, and they give us the platform of how to run a business, they give us a lot of the materials we need, so we’re under the JA charter,” Driedger says. “All of our brands say that, so when you see the JA logo on our chap stick, it identifies us as an organisation under JA, and the JA is known worldwide.”
In addition to getting business experience, the students also have a chance to get scholarships and education opportunities through the class.
“There’s also opportunities for scholarships and stuff through Junior Achievement,” Driedger says. “They have to, at the end, write a report on how things went over the year. They can nominate their classmates for different awards, like Best President or Top Seller awards, and if they’re awarded some of those awards, they can actually go to a higher level conference with every other award winner.”
Driedger explained that the class is an accredited class, able to go on a student’s transcript and allow them into universities.
“If anyone’s interested in becoming an entrepreneur, or even just is interested in how that works, it’s a great class to take. It’s a lot of fun, it’s a good program,” she says. “I really enjoy it.”
