A new financial literacy enrichment course at
Kilgour School is expanding, spurred by a $24,000 innovation grant awarded by tech communications company
MiCTA.
The grant builds on a class that Cincinnati's
Partnership for Innovation in Education (or PIE) piloted at the school, called Student MBA: Bringing Business to the Classroom.
Mary Welsh Schlueter, PIE's founder and chief executive, developed and taught the five-week class at Kilgour as part of a student enrichment period. Schlueter, a Kilgour parent, modeled the class after a
Harvard Business School course.
"I taught basic concepts, including the
SWOT analysis, the five Ps of marketing and the product life cycle," says Schlueter.
Students' tech, financial and entrepreneurial skills were tapped when they were asked to find ways to increase lemon sales.
"They developed many new ideas and used lemons in different ways, not just as a food source or cleaning agent," says Schlueter.
The project led to the creation of an
Android app, a game called
Lemon Smash. "The goal of the game is to smash lemons to make lemonade so you can make some moo-lah," its description reads. Proceeds from the 99-cent app go back to the school.
The class and app creation brought on some big partners.
Sprint donated the technology,
UC's Economics Center wrote and compiled all the achievement assessments and
NKU’s Center for Applied Informatics helped students design and develop the app. There are plans to make it available for the iPhone as well.
"This was a $100,000 project, and all of the work was done pro-bono," Schlueter says.
The MiCTA grant will allow the class to continue. It will also fund 20 new handheld tablets for the school's gifted program.
NKU will partner with the school to offer an app development class, which will also be available to any
Cincinnati Public Schools student who has access to take the class virtually.
PIE is looking to expand funding opportunities for the STEM-aligned program using app development and technology to "incubate" students' entrepreneurial efforts and promote across the globe, says Schlueter. It's a way to help students learn valuable skills, provide a new revenue stream for schools, and allow deeper tech uililzation for K-8 students and teachers across all subject areas.
By Feoshia H. Davis
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