Economics project provides learning opportunity for students

Students flooded the campus gym on March 18, 2015, to shop at student-made booths marketing different products.

The annual economics fair (econ fair for short) took place with around 20-student run booths.

The fair is held with the goal of helping Robert Foshee’s economics and civics students further understand their topic. Foshee shared his reasons for holding the event.

“We want to find ways to connect information from class to a real world situation. We learn about supply, demand, budgets, but it doesn’t really get ingrained until you do something with it,” Foshee said. “They have to pick a product to make, figure out a budget for it, they have to market it.” I think it’s a pretty cool way to learn it without having to read a book or listen to a lecture.”

Students in groups of two-three designed products from food, clothing and jewelry. After preparing it and marketing through posters around school and social media accounts, they sold their products in the gym. Julianna Rosik, ’16, sold boba drinks with two other students during the fair. Rosik commented on the work and learning experience.

‘The Econ fair was fun, but it was also pretty stressful,” Rosik said. “We learned about entrepreneurship during the Economics fair and the process of selling a product, and though this experience I realized that I do not want to be an entrepreneur. My group did well with our product Bubble Joy Boba drink, but when we added up our total costs, we found out our profits barely made us break even. It was fun even though we didn’t make much money.”

We learn about supply, demand, budgets, but it doesn’t really get ingrained until you do something with it. They have to pick a product to make, figure out a budget for it, they have to market it. I think it’s a pretty cool way to learn it without having to read a book or listen to a lecture. — Robert Foshee, Economics teacher.

This is the second year the fair took place in the gym. Previously, the Economics fair was set up in the lunch area. The set up of the booths changed too, in hopes of making the process more efficient for the shoppers and the students to make it easier to shop and sell. Eunsol (Dana) Kwon, ’16, commented on the arrangement.

“I thought it was really comfortable and a good idea because I could see ever item easily and I could quickly find which food I wanted,” Kwon said. “I liked every booth but my favorite was one of the cookie booths.”

The next economic fair will be held with next years’ civics students.

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