Nichole Schuh, Alaska Business Week program director addressed a joint Chamber of Commerce last week to promote the unique learning experience for high school students across the State of Alaska. Sponsored by the Alaska Chamber, Alaska Business Week (ABW) is a one-week summer program teaching students the basics of business, leadership and entrepreneurship. “We take 65 students from around the state each year and give them the tools for success after high school. We’ve had great success with students coming out of the program and starting their own businesses as well as going on to college and achieving their life goals. It’s really exciting to see,” Schuh told the Chamber. Now in its’ 7th year ABW participants live on a college campus and work as teams in a dynamic business simulation with the guidance of a mentor from the business community, “We have seen students with a variety of interests, not just business complete the week and really find their niche and apply what they learn in the classroom to what they want to achieve with their life,” she added. According to Schuh after completing the program, students have a competitive edge on workplace readiness, college preparation and overall life success. “This is basically a college level simulation where they make real world decisions and also have to come together to create product or service.

They do earn college credit for completing the week, but they also have a lot of fun and make new friends from all over Alaska,” said Schuh. The only requirement for applying for the ABW is to be a high school student having completed their first year or graduating in 2016. The total cost for the week including everything except transportation to Anchorage is $475, “It actually costs ABW about $2,000 per participant to put the program on but we have a bunch of generous sponsors such as Tesoro that step up to off-set 75% of that cost,” explained Schuh. This year according to Tami Murray executive director of the Soldotna Chamber, the Chamber will be offering a paid tuition to ABW as their Caring for the Kenai student recognition award. Schuh says registration is on a first come first served basis and that they already have about 40 students registered with only 25 spaces open. Registration can be done on line at www.alaskachamber.com/ABW or for more information contact Nichole Schuh at nschuh@alaskachamber.com.