Entrepreneurship Class pitches business ideas

Three teams of seniors in Nick Francis’s entrepreneurship class pitched their business ideas to a group of local business leaders during the Seven Hills “Shark Tank” event. The students had only six weeks to come up with ideas for a business, conduct research, and develop plans for financing, marketing, and development. “This course is much more hands on in terms of student involvement and students taking responsibility for what happens. We try to make it as real world as possible,” Francis said, adding each team worked with local businesses to develop their ideas. Eli Joffe and Amaiya Sims created Evolution, which would connect student athletes to trainers and give the athletes a platform to grow their player profile. Daniela Amadeo-Muniz, Jenna Villar, and Emma Schlueter created Gift-It, an app to keep track of and send gift cards. Santiago Rodriguez, Kevin Chen, and Jonathan Lee created Autoponic, an automated, indoor gardening device. The sharks picked Gift-It as the winner because of its scalability.