Congratulations to the following Junior Achievement officers: Ramon Angeles (Vice President of Finance), Lisa Dhanesri (President and Vice President of Public Relations), Precious Drew (Vice President of Marketing and Human Resources) and Pa Lor (Vice President for Production) for coming in first place at the Junior Achievement Competition. These four students received a $1,000 scholarship. Precious Drew also received a $20 gift card for having the most tweets letting her friends know about the JA competition. Precious will also be featured in the Junior Achievement’s Annual Report (not because of the tweets) because of her passion and amazing outlook on life, college, and the future!

This year the students designed and hand-made Edison fleece scarves to raise money that went towards three organizations: Breast Cancer, Support Your Troops, and the all night senior party sponsored by the Tommie Boosters (Edison Parent Group). They were evaluated in three categories: (1) Business Plan; (2) A four minute presentation on their company in front of everyone; (3) personal interviews with the judges identifying what they learned and how they overcame their challenges. All three of these results, put them in First place in this competition.

This project aligns with the business curriculum taught in the Business classes, Entrepreneurship class and Voyager Leadership program, that prepares them for college and career opportunities and helps them to actually take everything they are learning in their classes and apply them to the real-world.

Please congratulate these incredible students; they went over and beyond this year, making a product. They will be working hard at making changes to their business plan and video to submit for Nationals by May 9. If their project gets accepted, they will be competing in Washington, DC the week of June 16! Thank you to everyone who has shown their support to this team. The sales from the scarves were a key component to this competition.

Junior Achievement is a program that allows students to apply all the skills they are learning in the classroom to a real-life situation by designing a company from start to finish, producing, marketing, and selling a product. Students learn how to develop their "soft" skills by working in teams, communicating with professionals and the community, and presenting their company in front of other entrepreneurs, CEO's and outstanding business people in the community. Through this program, students develop leadership and interpersonal skills.