ROTARY CLUB HOLDS 5TH ANNUAL CAMP ENTERPRISE

Fifty students from eight area high schools attended the 5th annual "Camp Enterprise" held at the Peaceful Valley Camp In St, Mary, Mo. on September 13th & 14th.

Camp Enterprise is a major vocational service project of the Rotary Clubs of the Jackson and Cape Girardeau area. The Camp was an intensive two-day seminar and workshop on business issues where the students interacted with business executives, government representatives and university personnel from the surrounding area.

Students arrived by bus from their respective areas and were immediately immersed in a stimulating give-and-take environment. Recreational activities revolved around team building support which was also used in the class room setting.

The 50 students attending the seminar were divided into 8 teams with each team forming a company involved in the manufacturing of a sophisticated electronic pen. The teams chose a company name and competed among each other for a period of eight quarters, a simulated two year span of business. The students were able to operate their individual companies, control their inventories and production, manipulate manufacturing costs relative to the variables in the economy,determine the selling prices of finished goods and budget marketing and promotional expenses . Each quarter all of these factors were fed into a computer simulation program, which took into account all of the teams plans, and then gave back the unit sales and market share for each company generated from the total market available.

The objective of this seminar was to expose students to the business world on a personal level and hopefully discover that a business career may offer personal satisfaction, allow creativity, provide opportunity and contribute to society.

This years seminar was the fifth for the Cape and Jackson Rotary Clubs. The Clubs plan to continue to provide this opportunity for the area youth with the mission to Camp Enterprise being "to introduce area high school seniors to the entrepreneurial skills necessary to compete in tomorrow's business environment, while emphasizing the Ideals of Rotary in business practices for these future leaders."