I having been thinking about our idea, and there is no other product like the one we would try and create. Why not us!?-future hawlket entrepreneur

On Wednesday, May 8th, students from the spring semester Entrepreneurship for Others (EFO) course came together for their culminating pitch night event! The students worked very hard on solving a unique, authentic problem and pitched their solutions at the event. Nearly 100 parents and alumni attended the event to celebrate the Hawklet entrepreneurs.

Below is a list of the teams that competed:

Detanglers - 3d printed solution to tangled headphones. First Stop - Makerspace concept to build community for people to learn and work on their car. Golf Savers - Solution to save the lives of golfers and the game of golf. Park & Go - Service to create cheaper event parking options. Secure the Bag - Service to prevent delivered packages from being stolen; the ‘door dash’ of Amazon package delivery. Water Resisters - Solution to protect pocketed cell phones from being damaged by water.

Student teams has 5 minutes to pitch their solution. They were required to validate their problem, demonstrate market research, , share how they were aided by mentors along the way, differentiate their solution from others and articulate their next steps (pitch deck rubrics shown below).

An example slide deck from seniors Adam Albritton, Sam Johnson & Tanner Overly can be seen below:

At the end of the pitch night, EFO groups were judged by the following:

Rebecca Gubbels from the UMKC Small Business & Technology Development Center Earnest McCoy ‘06, Founder & Chief Pilot of Alt Spec UAS Joshua Taimoor Nana ‘98, President at MTAR LLC

After meticulous deliberation, it was determined that the Best Pitch award was earned by the Water Resiters! These students learned how to sew in order to make a prototype for their water proof pocket. They even demonstrated their prototype (successfully!) with a bucket of water on stage! Afterwards, the students admitted that they were not sure if it would work or not.

The Most Viable Product award went to the Detanglers. These students iterated 4 versions of their prototype and came away with a 3d printed solution. They incorporated lots of home made videos during their presentation and even demonstrated the effectiveness of their invention live. One of the judges even offered to invest in their endeavor should they choose to pursue it further!

In fact, the First Stop group (slide deck featured above) was contacted about the Kansas Speedway about trialing their concept with their constituents. Additionally, the Water Resisters were planning on continuing their project over the summer. The water resister students were ‘on fire’ after pitch night. Here is a quote from a student email in the water resisters group:

“Mr. Owsley, I would like to know if you you think we could legitimately try and make this water proof pocket idea work? I having been thinking about our idea, and there is no other product like the one we would try and create. Why not us!?”

The EFO pitch nights continue to get better and better. It will be exciting to see what the 2019-2020 Rockhurst High School Hawklet entrepreneurs will come up with to solve problems for other people!

The second quarter project was their completed slide deck and 60% of their final grade was determined from their pitch night performance. The other 40% of their final grade resulted from their final reflection grade, which analyzed how their definition of an ‘entrepreneurial mindset’ evolved over the course of the semester. If you have any comments on how we can improve the rubrics below, then please do so or email class instructor, Mr. Greg Owsley.

AMDG!