As excerpted on 8/16/98 from the Ogden Standard Examiner:

Business Week prepares students

Event gives teenagers a feel of the corporate world

LOGAN -- If someday you purchase skis at Simon Bravo's ski shop, know that he's a businessman who got an early start.

Bravo, a St. Joseph High student last year who will be a junior at Bonneville High this year, was among 192 high school students who recently participated in the 18th annual Utah Business Week, a hectic week of studying the free enterprise system.

The event, sponsored by the Salt Lake Area Chamber of Commerce, provided the students with the basics of business ownership by allowing groups to organize and operate mythical businesses and learn about marketing, advertising, supply and demand, competition, business ethics, employee/employer relations, research and development, pricing, sales and human resources.

Bravo actually isn't sure how he'll use the information, but owning a ski shop is one possibility.

"I've never done anything like this before but I thought it would be fun to try. This will look good on any college application," he said.

"I'm not sure what I want to do, but this is getting my feet wet about a lot of different things and I'm learning a lot about business. If I do go into business, I will be a lot further ahead and know how to run it and what to do. This is giving me a better idea about business, but I still have things I want to explore."

"It's an intensive course in the free enterprise system," event chairman Roger Bennett said. "We try to structure it so that they can learn the information they need to get out and run their own company. But even if they don't want to be an entrepreneur, if they want to work at another company, this stimulates them to be a better worker for their employer.

"Some of the students have had business classes but it's not as intensive as this. It's a crash course, but that's the way things can be in business, too."

Sixteen advisers, from business and education, and 11 staff members coordinated the activities, which are designed to be power-packed.

"We reinforce a lot of what they are talking about and give the students a hands-on look at what the free enterprise system can do for them," Bennett said.

Maria Sweeten Pace, special projects director for the chamber and program director for Utah Business Week, said some former participants have opened their own businesses. "We're seeing those kinds of successes, and the advisers get letters from kids who attended five or six years ago to tell them how they've used what they learned," she said. "These advisers have that type of impact on the kids."

The participants typically are high school students in their junior or senior years, and the controlled setting and concentrated instruction sessions work well for them, she said.

"This is an excellent opportunity for hands-on learning when they're ready to learn and willing to learn. When they are in their first couple of years in college, they will know a lot of practical information and be that much better."

Angie Galloway, a Bonneville High junior, believes that's the case. The school's Future Business Leaders of America president, Galloway found even the initial activities beneficial.

"When I first got here, I didn't know anyone, and that itself put me in the place of being in business. You have to work together and develop relationships with your co-workers, so this has been a boost to my comfort zone."

She must have learned quickly. She was elected her mythical company's CEO. But she knows the real world is different.

"This lets you know that mov ing up in business is a gradual process. You start at the bottom. You can't say that by next year you'll be the CEO of a large company."

The week also gave her a better appreciation for what businesses produce, she said. "This chair, for instance, didn't pop out of nowhere. It didn't just show up at ZCMI. A lot of people worked hard to put this out."

Galloway plans to return next summer and cited the help of sponsoring businesses with making the event successful.

"The companies feel a commitment to it and realize that we are the next generation of businesspeople, and it (the week) emphasizes the good kids that want to succeed in life and not what a lot of people think about Generation X kids."

Sweeten Pace also commended the sponsors. "When they hire, they will look for these types of kids, so they realize they're investing in the future."

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