Carol Johnson, Southern Indiana Business Report
LOOGOOTEE – A new program in Martin County to teach entrepreneurship and leadership skills to high school upperclassmen is flourishing in its first year.
Martin County CEO launched in August following a successful community effort to raise $70,000 to sustain the program through its first few years.
Todd Baker, a Martin County business owner, was hired as class facilitator. He leads a group of 14 students, all juniors and seniors from Loogootee and Shoals high schools.
CEO is a nationally recognized program created by the Midland Institute, based in Effingham, Illinois.
The impetus for bringing the CEO program to Martin County was to reverse the trend of young people leaving Martin County.
“The goal is to get students to come back to Martin County, whether that’s as a civic leader or a business leader, and provide opportunities here,” Baker said. “As the program matures, I think that will be the biggest benefit.”
The Martin County Alliance for Economic Growth led the fundraising.
“When the Alliance began fundraising to get the CEO program to Martin County, we had seen and heard from our neighbors in Daviess County how impactful of a program CEO truly is,” said Jessica Potts, executive director of the Alliance. “It’s noticeable that so many of our youth are graduating high school, going away to college, and not coming back home to Martin County. We, as an organization, thought this would be a great opportunity for our juniors and seniors to begin learning about businesses and opportunities available to them right here.”
Site visits, work-based projects
Martin County CEO meets five mornings a week at the Martin County Fairgrounds from 7:45-9:15 a.m. Class sessions can be visits to businesses or visits from business and community leaders. Students are expected to engage with the business owners, which helps them develop interpersonal skills. By the end of the school year, students will have visited between 60 and 75 businesses. Work-based projects are also part of the curriculum.
Baker said the site visits have opened students’ eyes to the number and variety of businesses in the county. Visits have included Southern Indiana Steel, Harvest Health & Rehab and a few combined visits to learn about the Indianapolis Indians and Indiana Pacers with the Daviess County CEO program. Students are also paired with a mentor from the community that they meet with monthly.
Another component of the CEO is to give students a “real-life” experience. For students accustomed to traditional learning, Baker said CEO requires students to change how they approach projects.
One of the first projects students had to complete was to approach businesses to sponsor their name badges, a task that gave students a chance to practice their soft skills.
Currently, students are planning a pickleball tournament Feb. 15 in Loogootee to raise money for business start-ups that students will begin working on this spring.
“The pickleball tournament is our class business. They’ve been working on finding sponsors, advertising and signing up teams,” Baker said. “What they’ve done is really like formalizing a business plan. CEO does a very good job of teaching kids that this isn’t school. It’s a business class and it’s real money, whether it’s income or taking on debt, students need to understand the ramifications of that.”
Out of 14 students in the class, Baker said most of the students are interested in improving their soft skills and just a handful have a strong interest in starting a business of their own some day.
“This is an active group, they’re not afraid of speaking up,” he said. “They’ve all improved their soft skills since the school year started.”
Community involvement is another activity of Martin County CEO. In December, CEO students made and sold s’mores kits during Christmas events in downtown Loogootee.
Baker is well suited for the role of facilitator. A graduate of Indiana University, he has a degree in secondary education and knows what it means to own a business. He and his wife own Bo-Mac’s Drive-in, a Martin County favorite since 1960.
Potts said Martin County CEO, by teaching high schoolers about business development, is an investment in the county’s future.
“There is so much talent in those school hallways, and we believe the next big business idea could be ignited from learning from other businesses during business visits. Not to mention, it’s 2025, you can be in Martin County and do business all over the world,” Potts said. “Our hope and vision for this program is for it to encourage entrepreneurship, show our students the endless opportunities that are available to them right here at home, and most importantly, make them want to call Martin County home into their adulthood.”