Economics business projects

This year, Robert Alvarado's economics classes are learning something a bit unusual for an everyday high school class. The students are creating their own individual businesses.Though the students aren’t establishing a full- fledged functioning business, they are learning the process of becoming entrepreneurs. Through the creative minds of our Senior students, a number of interesting ideas are being brought to fruition. “This project teaches students about the different aspects of American business: private ownership, capitalism, profit-motive, risk taking, entrepreneurship, taxes, regulations, etc.,” Alvarado said.This project offers a unique experience that allows students to expand their knowledge about the American business system, and see what it would be like to actually have their own business. This project also exposes students to entrepreneurship firsthand by learning more about the businesses in their local community. Through developing skills like problem solving and learning the possibilities of the American economy, many of these students are offered a very personal lesson.William Asher (’18) has created a unique business called Great Graft. Asher’s business is a service that provides pre-grafted trees made to the customers specifications. Grafting, or graftage, is when the tissues of plants are joined to continue their growth together. This allows fruit trees of the same family, such as citrus, to be grafted and eventually produce multiple types of citrus fruit. “You could have an orange tree with every citrus from that family on the same tree,” Asher said.He got this idea after a visit to one of his friends’ grandparents who taught them about grafting and the world of science. Grafting has lead to many delicious and popular fruit, such as california’s “typical” orange and the valencia orange, which is hybridized from a pummelo and mandarin orange. This technology of hybridization of plants could allow more appealing and diverse plants, such as the recently developed pluot, aprium, plum hybrids and apricots.Another interesting idea inspired by this project was Oscar Fuentes’ (’18) clever idea for a skateboard company, Skate-4-Us, that offers affordable skate equipment. With boarding equipment such as decks, ranging from $55 to $60, trucks, ranging from $40 to $55, and wheels, averaging at about $35, it can get pretty expensive to buy and fix boards. Fuentes himself is frustrated with the outrageous prices of skate equipment.“I thought of [it] because I myself skate and I hate buying boarding for $200, plus most kids don’t have that type of money,” Fuentes said.These are just a few examples of the many brilliant ideas created from this business class project, and show the creativity developed from this class. Ranging from genetics and grafted trees to skateboarding, many inventive ideas have been formed through this project that have opened the doors to lesser known subjects and processes of the American Economy.