The Community Education Coalition (CEC) was created in 2015 as a workforce development initiative for Franklin County. The coalition defined a vision "To develop a strong community where all individuals have the opportunity to grow and prosper.
The Community Education Guiding Coalition (CEC) focused on three priority areas and formed three specific groups of focus: Employability, Early Childhood Education, and Well-Being. The Foundation sponsors the CEC Employability group, United Way leads early childhood education efforts and Healthy Franklin County addresses well-being in our community.
CEC - Employability
This Foundation sponsored group is led by Angela Austin of WellSpan and Dr. Michael Doncheski of Penn State Mont Alto. The employability group addresses workforce development concerns from grade 3 through retirement. The group partners with the Franklin County Career and Technology Center to hold a career exploration expo prior to the middle school open house at the school each March, and hosts an annual high school business challenge, and further promotes workforce development thru grants like Educators in the Workplace.
The Franklin County High School Business Challenge
The Purpose
The Franklin County High School Business Challenge encourages area high school students to create their own fictional, yet profitable and sustainable business plans. This task allows students to use both creative thinking and critical analysis skills in establishing plans for a sustainable enterprise that are socially and environmentally responsible and financially effective.
Plans are evaluated by area business leaders, and finalists are invited to pitch their plans at the Franklin County High School Business Challenge event in April 2020 at the Franklin County Career and Technology Center. Scholarship dollars are awarded to the top three highest scoring teams. The Franklin County High School Business Challenge allows students and business people to be actively engaged in each other’s worlds.
The Scenario
In today’s world there is a new market for businesses that are socially responsible, environmentally conscious and economically viable. The Franklin County High School Business Challenge invites teams of student entrepreneurs to develop and pitch business plans for sustainable enterprise they believe would meet the criteria, best serve the region and its residents, and financially succeed in Franklin County, Pa.
Each business proposal must address and embrace the principles of triple bottom-line sustainability: people, planet and profit. All proposed plans will be evaluated to determine which company could generate the largest and quickest return on investment, create the newest jobs in the region, and operate in a socially impactful and environmentally conscious way.
Judging
Written business plans will be evaluated by members of the members of the Chambersburg Chamber Foundation’s Community Education Coalition. Judging criteria will be based on:
Ingenuity shown in the selection of a business and target market
Thoroughness and completeness of the plan
Integration of triple bottom-line sustainability
Accuracy of the research provided.
Final judging and selection of the Challenge winner will be via oral presentations (pitching of proposals like on the TV show Shark Tank), judged by a panel of local business leaders. Judges will consider teams’ business plans, their overall proposal pitches and the way students respond to judges’ extemporaneous questions during presentations.
Scholarship prizes will be awarded to the top three highest-scoring team. First place wins $750, second place wins $500 and third place wins $250
Information for the 2020 contest is available here.
Franklin County High School Business Challenge is presented by the CADC and these sponsors:
Franklin County High School Business Challenge Winners:
2018: Greencastle-Antrim High School: AssemBuild - Collin Griffin, Matthew Lynerd, Clare Hudak
2017: Greencastle-Antrim High School: Grean Bag - Collin Griffin, Matthew Lynerd, Nick Starkey, Austin Straley, Dylan Starkey
