Think Tank Leadership Impact Project

Think Tank-

For our project in Management and Leadership, our goal was to develop product ideas that target teen’s needs and leave a lasting impact on the teen community.  First, our group came up with a number of problems that teens face in everyday life.  Then, we cut down the list into eight final ideas.  Next, the group split up into three separate groups and took one idea for their own to research and perfect.  The ideas chosen were: 

• a website with recommendations for classes,

• a schedule pen,

• a vending machine

• an app that told students if there were any parking spots available at the school.  

Schedule Pen-  Our group’s idea was to create a product that would aid high school student’s in an everyday way.  The actual idea was a pen that would have a paper pennant inside that could be pulled out of the pen.  The pennant would have the late arrival and assembly bell schedules, as well as a normal schedule. Colored a nice green for GBN school spirit

Recommendations-  Our section of the think tank found a need for a website that helps kids decide what classes they are going to enroll in. This site would allow students to rate and review classes that are offered at Glenbrook North. Currently at GBN the only way of knowing what kind of class you're signing up for is by word of mouth, the student handbook, and your counselor. Making this website would help students know the type of class they are signing up for and allows them to use their best judgment to decide if a course will suit them well. For our project in Management and Leadership, our goal was to develop  a product ideas that targets teens and execute our plan by creating a website from a pre made page site like Wix. com or Squarespace.com. These websites vary in price from $5-25 a month and would give us a set template to design our page with. We would advertise our site by word of mouth around the school, hand out flyers around the Northshore area, and use the radio. The reason why this would be different from ratemyteachers.com would be because we would try to make this more community oriented. On this website we could offer study material specific to classes that would make people want to use it regularly. We would make money with advertisements. For more information click here

Parking Space- A typical problem we found throughout students in GBN (typically upperclassmen) was that they wouldn't know which parking lot is filled. We came up the idea to create an app that shows GBN students how many spots are left available in each lot around GBN. This would solve the problem of students wasting time instead of getting to class. We researched how I passes worked seeing if it would relate to this product. We found out that they worked with putting RFID trackers on the car and having them go under and RFID scanner that would transmit data. We were planning on doing that so we would need to find out how much and where we can get RFID trackers, scanners and mounts to hold the scanners. The problems we ran into were that we couldn't find a way to tell which spots were available or tell when cars left the parking lot. Another problem was the price, we couldn't find a way to make a profit after spending a couple thousand dollars on RFID chips and readers so it wouldn't be profitable. Also we didn't have enough knowledge on how everything worked and what systems we would need. The final problem we found is that this product would cause teens to look at their phones when they should be focused on driving. So this product ultimately did not work. For more information about this innovative idea click here

Vending Machine- We thought of a common problem that many people forget important necessities while going to the beach. To fix that problem this section of the entrepreneur group pursued the idea of a vending machine that would be installed on beach property containing products that are commonly forgotten such as sunscreen, sunglasses, water toys, etc. We researched how much a vending machine would cost (with shipping and handling), how many items it would hold, where would we get the supplies, and how much we would sell the supplies for. Some of the problems that we encountered is that we were unable to install a vending machine on the Lake Shore Drive beach because they had an existing contract with the beach vendors prohibiting us to install another one. We also couldn't install onto Glencoe beach because we would have to fill out an application and wouldn't know if we were able to until 2015 October. However the lady we talked to on the phone said it was a very good idea, we would just need to fill out an app. We also wouldn't know how profitable it would've been because we couldn't figure out the average attendance at Glencoe beach. So all in all the plan did not work. For more information click here

To learn more about the Think Tanks project click here

Increase School Spirit II

School Spirit

As our Leadership Impact Project, we decided to increase school spirit at Glenbrook North High School. By continuing the previous semester’s project, and adding in our own ideas, we wanted to make a lasting impact on the GBN community for years to come.

Before implementing an action plan, we conducted research to identify the consensus of the GBN students regarding school spirit. We used a survey gathered by the last group, as well as our own surveys to gather information. We found that students generally felt that spirit was not reaching its full potential. Younger students seemed to be reluctant to participate in dress up days because very few people participate. Our group felt that in order to get people involved, we needed to advertise school spirit.

Original Plan

Our original plan called for a wide array of projects and goals. The plan included a "change challenge" during Pride Week, as well as counting students dressing up on spirit days. Also, we wanted to create a Pride Week champion to stir up competition among the classes. We also wanted to use creative advertising techniques such as sidewalk chalk and window painting to promote school spirit. Lastly, we set a goal to get 500 students onto the Spartan Spirit Squad Google+ Community page.

Original Plan: https://docs.google.com/a/glenbrook225.org/document/d/1-nGZlQ2XSmQhDbEZj2b245xeFjbcICWIQKabWehQWNw/edit?usp=sharing

Execution

What we were able to accomplish ended up being vastly different from our original plan. It turned out that other groups were in charge of Spirit Week, so we did not have much room to implement our ideas, especially with the time given. Additionally, our creative advertising did not go as planned because we could not get approval from Dr. Tarjan. Finally, we had to adapt the Google+ Community initiative due to a shift in its use and purpose. In response, we decided to design flyers promoting the Google+ Community, Game of the Week and Green and Gold Fridays. We also designed T-shirts for the Spartan World Tour.

Executed Business Plan:
https://docs.google.com/a/glenbrook225.org/document/d/1WIwJnXBBEWPnV00j3_dyjC-kLoBmu9ZHexMk0ROVYmo/edit?usp=sharing

Definition of Success Criteria

The success of our group cannot be counted, nor can our group’s success immediately be shown. We wanted to create a more spirited place for the future GBN. Because we started so late in the year, it was tough to get many people to change their view on spirit days. Our success will be seen in the years to come. We wanted to spark the GBN community so we can have school spirit increase each year.

Burger Day Marketing and Promotion Team

Burger Day XII A Great Success

Strategic Goal

• Increase attendance and awareness for Burger Day
• Create school spirit and community feel in benefiting a good cause

The Burger Day Marketing and Promotion Team, consisting of students from Glenbrook North High School, headed by Jason Spector, ran the most attended Burger Day in the last four years with nearly 200 high school students from both Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South High School attending the event.

One hundred percent of the proceeds from the event went towards benefiting Ronald McDonald Charities in the Chicagoland and Northwest Indiana areas as well as Ronald McDonald House.

Burger Day began as a prank by a group of GBS and GBN athletes who attended middle school together. "One day, after a cross country meet, they decided to come to this (Plaza Del Prado) McDonald's and buy out all of the burgers." The owner then came and asked if they can make this “prank” into an event that raises money for charities.

To raise awareness for the event, our team hung up posters, and posted flyers all around the school. These were placed in areas around the school where many students hang out so it can increase the likelihood of being seen. Morning announcements were made every day the week before the event so everyone in the school can hear the event. Team members also sold Burger Day t-shirts in the ticket booth for $10 each during their lunch and free periods. Glenbrook North and Glenbrook South were able to raise nearly $2500 from t-shirts alone.  Awareness was spread evenly, from upper classmen through SRTs and advocacy classes, to freshmen in peer groups.

One way we marketed for Burger Day was through social media sites such as Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter. We thought social media was an effective way to reach a lot of high school students while not spending any money. The first way we advertised on social media was by creating a pump-up video/commercial on Youtube. Then we transitioned into advertising on facebook by sharing this video on youtube. Finally, about a week before the event we created a Burger Day event on Facebook which not only advertised by sending invites to a ton of people on Facebook, but it also helped give us a head count on how many people are going to show at the even. Overall, social media was a huge factor in marketing for Burger Day.

The Management and Leadership team attempted to reach out to underclassmen because, according to the research, underclassmen knew the least about what Burger Day is. The team found that a good way to reach out to underclassmen was through peer group and advocacy classes. Flyers and posters were hung up in the peer group hallway and peer group leaders talked about the event to freshmen. A team member also talked to advo classes to advertise to sophomores. Although outreach was attempted, only a few underclassmen were seen at the event.

Burger Day took place on April 19, 2015 at McDonalds at Plaza Del Prado and lasted from 12:00 p.m. - 4:00p.m. The community event brought children, adults, and students from the two schools and the surrounding community.

This year’s Burger Day event event raised $35,000, all of which went to benefit Ronald McDonald’s House Charities.

Link to action plan/proposal: here