WA Business Week 11/30-12/4/2015

Pasco School District's Enterprise Week 2015
TRAC
​Pasco, WA

I had a wonderful week serving as a company advisor for 16 seniors from three different high schools. They formed a company and carried out six successful quarters to become division winners (850 students, 52 teams/companies) in two categories.

I had an amazing group of kids who worked so well together you'd think they'd all known each other beforehand. The first day was a little rocky, but after the shyness and awkwardness was overcome they received my wisdom where needed and got right to work. There were actually only 3.5 work days because of weather cancellations and my kiddos still came out as champions.

You know I'm proud of them because there are people who've volunteered with Enterprise for all 16 years it's been in existence whose companies haven't won anything and my mentees won two categories - 1st Place in Marketing, 2nd Place Overall -  my first year. Once a teacher, always a teacher.

I also received some awesome feedback from the students; it was hard not to cry. One of the young men, Kalob, said they learned more in that one week (less than) than in a whole year of school. That's simultaneously awesome and unfortunate. Another young man, Colby, commented that they only did so well because I was their advisor.

At the advisor celebration dinner there were no seats available for Z and I, so they had to make room and we were favored to have sat with the incoming district Superintendent. She said if I ever decided to return to teaching to give her my resume directly.

I was nominated - for some reason - to do table introductions and when I finished they were all gushing over me saying, "Give us your business cards," "Stay in touch," "We have to bring you back next year for sure." It's so funny I was nervous about what I'd say because I'd just met these folks 20 minutes prior and I needed to tell their names and businesses but when I got up I did fine. I asked Z if he could tell I was nervous and he said not at all, I seemed like a professional.

What a tremendous honor. Experiences such as this one almost make me want to return to public education. Almost.

Being fed in the teacher's lounge was excellent as always. There was everything you could want to snack all day from donuts to cheese and crackers to bagels and oatmeal. And all-you-could-drink tea, coffee, water and juice. That's one thing I'd forgotten about being a teacher is that we don't skimp on food in the lounge. The school lunches we were given outside of the lounge left much to be desired. Overall it was fabulous and I'm so blessed to have had the opportunity to represent Z Solves Problems in such a way.