Five Edison students, Max Barnard, Raul Lazcano Gonzalez, Emanuel Hill (Manny), Der Her and Alan Vang, attended Camp Enterprise for 2 1/2 days working with professionals from the business community and students from all over Minnesota.
The camp is fully sponsored by the North and Uptown Rotary club at the cost of $350 per student. Each student will be eligible to win one of several scholarships totaling at least $5,000 for their participation, teamwork, leadership, case study presentations and an individual essay.
Alan Vang was one of 6 team members (from six other high schools) that attended Camp Enterprise last week and his team won first place! Alan acted as the director of sales and marketing and had to present before a panel and the students. Below is a letter from his mentor, Randy J. Sparling
Alan acted as the Director of Sales and Marketing for his team. They selected the name “Grace Tech” for the Company and named the product “Grace Glass.” The product was a device to permit the user playing the Pokémon Go Game to see projected on the lens of eye glasses the Pokémon target while moving about in the actual world.
The product was intended to:
• Allow for safer game play (permitting the player to pay attention to the actual world rather than the virtual world on their smart phone)
• Preservation of battery life of the player’s smart phone (as battery would not be drained down by keeping the display running)
• Increased “captures” as the player was able to cover more territory by not constantly monitoring the screen of their smart phone
As head of sales and marketing, Alan had to clearly explain the target market for the product and how the company planned to develop market awareness in the product and drive sales. I could tell that Alan was not very comfortable being in front of the four members of the venture capitalist panel in addition to the 25 + in the audience, but he did his job!
Camp E is a great program, but it is only possible due to the willingness of Rotary Clubs to sponsor students to attend. Thank you for sponsoring Alan. It was a pleasure to work with him.
Photo by John Flynn, the Camp E photographer
Front Row (left to right):
Daniel from Eden Prairie High School
Grace from Monticello High School
Nathan from Roseville High School
Back Row (left to right)
Peter (this year’s Camp E Chair)
Sam from Alexandria High School
Tyler from Stillwater High School
Alan from Edison High School in Mpls.
Seth from North Central University (assigned as counselor to the team)
Randy J. Sparling
Penny from Cotter High School in Winona
The member of the Venture Capital panel who announced the results of the competition