In October, the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences (CALS) in partnership with the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics (AAE) sponsored an experiential learning activity, known as a Case Competition, for high school students interested in agricultural business, economics, and/or marketing.
Case Competitions are not new to CALS or to AAE, as they are an important piece of the professional development curriculum for undergraduate students. What was novel this time is that the participants were high school students, with limited background or experience in the working world.
Nineteen students, ranging from freshman to seniors, joined to form a total of five teams, representing three Wisconsin schools: Edgewood High School (Madison), Sun Prairie West High School, and Sheboygan Falls High School. All participating students are members of the Future Business Leaders of America club. Teams were asked to develop a new chip product for a Wisconsin-based food company, bearing in mind rising costs of raw materials, labor and production. They had four weeks to conceptualize their product and produce a professional presentation that addressed the challenges identified in the case scenario, which included consumer preferences for taste and value, marketing strategies and sustainability. Each team’s specific recommendations were to be supported with appropriate evidence.
The final showcase was held on the UW campus. Each team had 15 minutes to present their proposal to a panel of judges. Presentations were evaluated not only on the quality of the content (creativity, ingenuity, thoughtfulness), but also on the quality of the team’s presentation skills.
This being the first such competition at the high school level, it was difficult to know what to expect, but the teams’ presentations far exceeded expectations. Proposals utilized well-known (cheese, soybeans) and not so well-known (kernza) Wisconsin agricultural products to create a variety of new, innovative snacks including Soy Snaps, Very Cherry (chips), and Kerennia, a chip made from kernza, a cereal grain similar to wheat with the advantage of being a perennial.
Members of the judging panel, comprised of current AAE & ABM students, were quite impressed by the students’ acumen, creativity and hard work. The judges noted that presentations were based on gaps in the market and the concepts were very innovative.
“The thing that surprised me the most was the students’ ability to think through the problem and provide fitting solutions from various different angles. All the concepts were quite different and showed the different perspectives they had towards solving the case given.” Raagav Vijayalakshmi Siva, a junior studying Ag Business Management.
For the students, the experience gave them a taste of what a career in ag business might be like. Overall, students noted some of the biggest takeaways were time management, research and presentation skills.
Edgewood high School team members said that they were motivated to participate because they “wanted to learn more about the agricultural side of business” and that it was “interesting to try something new and get a view of how Wisconsin does agribusiness.”
Sheboygan Falls High School team members Mason Klahn and Abby Schleicher said that they “really valued the experience for the multiple perspectives that they had to consider” and appreciated that they were able to work with each other and learn new things based on their personalities and interests between agriculture and marketing.
Key takeaways for Sun Prairie West High School team members were collaboration and creativity. They noted that “working together gave us the opportunity to be creative and innovate-figuring out what to do together, creating the concept, and designing the packaging.”
Experiential learning opportunities have become a cornerstone of the AAE undergraduate curriculum, and play a significant role in career readiness. This competition was an excellent forum to introduce high school students to CALS, and especially to opportunities for undergraduates within the AAE department.