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Summersville Chamber of Commerce Hosts Entrepreneurial Leadership
Banquet
By Marianne Taylor
The Summersville Youth Entrepreneurial Leadership Challenge, sponsored
by the Summersville Area Chamber of Commerce through a grant provided
by the City of Summersville, culminated with a banquet, held on
Tuesday, January 25 at the Summersville Arena & Conference Center.
Nine students from Nicholas County High School and New Life Christian
Academy were awarded for their participation in the Challenge.
Marianne Taylor, Executive Director of the Chamber, welcomed guests
and praised the students for their commitment to the program as well
as their interest and enthusiasm.
“This was the first year for the Challenge, and we could not have
asked for a better group of students,” said Marianne. “It has been my
pleasure to work with these students over the past four months and
watch them learn about business and leadership and then take that
information and use it to develop ideas for new businesses.”
Dennis Cherry, Director of Missions of the Allegheny Association of
Southern Baptists gave the invocation and Beth Goette of the Celtic
Cook prepared and served a delicious banquet.
Guest speaker of the evening was Mayor Robert Shafer. He
congratulated the students on their hard work and wonderful business
ideas. He also laid out a plan that would be helpful to them for
their future as young entrepreneurials.
“I encourage each of you to have a plan and know it thoroughly, stick
to it, network, and communicate in a professional manner,” said Mayor
Shafer.
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Following Mayor Shafer’s address, the following students received a
framed certificate for their participation in the Challenge: Logan
Cook and Josh Nuckols of New Life Christian Academy, Jesse Proctor,
Joshua Huffman, Vanessa Dodrill, Zhoe Lesher, Zackery Summers, Syera
Fazenbaker, and Shealyn Shafer of Nicholas County High School. In
addition, Logan Cook, Zhoe Lesher, Shealyn Shafer, Joshua Huffman, and
Syera Fazenbaker received a plaque for perfect attendance.
The highlight of the evening was the awarding of the first, second,
and third place prizes for the group presentations. Winners were:
third place and the winners of $50.00 Visa gift cards was Jersey’s, a
gym and sports retail store designed by Zhoe Lesher, Syera Fazenbaker,
and Vanessa Dodrill, second place prizes of digital cameras went to
Helping Hands Community Center, developed by Shealyn Shafer, Logan
Cook, and Josh Nuckols and first place winners of a Kindle E-reader
was Mighty Joe’s Internet Café, designed by Zackery Summers, Joshua
Huffman, and Jesse Proctor.
The Summersville Youth Entrepreneurial Leadership Challenge was an
idea developed by the Summersville Area Chamber of Commerce in an
effort to teach young adults about business and leadership with the
hopes that these young people would come back to the community and
start a new business.
“We were very fortunate that the City of Summersville believed in our
vision and through a grant provided by the City, helped the Chamber to
make the program a reality,” said Marianne.
The Challenge began in August with the selection of the nine students
from an application process. In September, the students attended the
first of a three part lecture series, featuring Jim Epling of the
Small Business Administration speaking on the steps of starting a new
business. The afternoon session included a visit to BB&T downtown for
lunch and hands on experience with financing a new business.
“Both Jim Epling and Tim Frantz were very helpful in providing the
students with the information needed to write a business plan and find
the finances to operate the business,” said Marianne.
October’s session included lectures by Heath Acree of Summersville
Regional Medical Center speaking on technology in business and Lisa
Baker of WV State University Extension and New River Gorge Regional
Development Authority lecturing on marketing. The students then
visited Cultured Catering and evaluated the new business location from
a marketing prospective. They also visited the Nicholas Chronicle and
learned the basics of developing an ad and then made their very own
commercial about the Challenge, which can be seen on SCTV.
Leadership and ethics was the final topic of the lecture series and
was very well presented by Mike Steadham, a member of the Summersville
City Council and employed by Ferguson Management Group. The students
then headed to Summersville Regional Medical Center and saw first hand
how a medical business operates and were treated to a visit to the new
hospital gift shop and some very good business advice from Pam Casto,
owner of City Floral & Gifts. The final business visits included
Mountaineer Physical Therapy and All Creatures Feed & Pet.
“We were very fortunate to have such fantastic lecturers for the
program and the actual visits to the businesses were instrumental in
helping the students develop their business ideas,” said Karen Cherry,
administrative assistant of the Chamber.
The entire program culminated in December when the students formed
groups of three and worked for two days developing their very own
business idea, including a written business and financial plan and an
oral presentation marketing their new business.
“I was very happy to be a judge for the student presentations and was
extremely impressed with their ideas and presentations,” said Chamber
member Stephen Young of Mountaineer Physical Therapy.
Pam Casto, President of the Board of Directors of the Summersville
Area Chamber of Commerce gave the closing remarks at the banquet.
“These young people here this evening have just completed a program
that is essential to our community. It is our hope that the students
will realize that our community has a lot to offer and we invite them
to start new businesses here in the future. The Chamber looks forward
to a new group of student entrepreneurials in 2011,” said Pam.
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