|
Dealer Tire Becomes an E CITY Corporate Partner
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Dealer Tire sponsors East Tech Fall 2005 Program |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| We are thankful for a second year of support from Dealer Tire, which is allowing us to take the E CITY entrepreneurship program to East Technical High School once again! Several employees of Dealer Tire assisted with student interviews and many will serve as business plan coaches in December. We are also thankful that CFO Pete Waters will be a guest speaker, teaching the segment on financial ratios and sharing his work experience with the students. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Dealer Tire Sponsors East Tech Spring 2005 Program |
|
|
Click on any image to see a larger version of the image
|
|
Thanks to Scott Mueller of Dealer Tire, 15 students at East Technical High School were able to participate in E CITY’s 70-hour entrepreneurship program. Scott and Dealer Tire made an investment in a full Corporate Partnership with E CITY, donating the entire $15,000 in program costs and the help of 15 volunteers from the company’s staff.
The East Tech program kicked off in January and concluded with a business plan competition on May 5, 2005. Under the leadership of Sharon Baker, E CITY’s Certified Entrepreneurship Teacher and also a teacher at East Tech, the students met three days each week, after school.
|
|
|
Pete Waters, CFO of Dealer Tire, speaking at the East Tech class.
|
|
|
This was a voluntary program for which no school credit is given. The payoff was an understanding of how to recognize a small business opportunity, how to create a business plan, and how to manage cash flow. For some, the knowledge will put a little extra cash in their pockets right now, and for others it might even become a means of financing a college education.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dealer Tire gave “real world” insights to the program, through the voices of its passionate employees. Pete Waters, Dealer Tire’s Chief Financial Officer, was one such voice. He told the story of the Mueller brothers, Scott and Dean, and how they recognized an opportunity in the tire industry and created Dealer Tire-- a wholesale company which grew out of the original Mueller Tire and Brake retail stores. He also taught some textbook concepts and demonstrated how they are
|
Scott Muller and Judges with a student
winner. |
|
| used in the workplace. For example, he taught the calculation of return on investment, and then noted that every single business decision really is made with this question in mind- what is the potential for return on my investment? |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Ms. Baker, Student and Nicole at graduation |
Pete Waters with the East Tech class.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| In addition, Mr. Waters inspired the students with an outline of the traits of successful entrepreneurs that he has known through his career. Students responded with questions and conversation that kept Mr. Waters occupied for the entire two-hour class period. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Other Dealer Tire employees worked one-on-one with the students in the final week of the program, to help them get their unique business ideas into PowerPoint business plan presentations. This relationship come at an opportune time, because these employees recently reviewed Dealer Tire’s original business plan against present-day reality, with their president, Scott Mueller. According to Dealer Tire’s Vice President of Human Resources, Pam Madden, employees were excited to connect with the teens in the community on this level.
|
| Scott Mueller, President of Dealer Tires, as a judge providing feed back to on of the students presenting her business plan in the competition. |
|
|
Scott Mueller served as a judge at the program’s culminating business plan competition.
E CITY thanks Dealer Tire for the partnership. The employees helped the students take the concepts E CITY teaches and make them real and valuable. They provided the connection between the classroom and life.
|
|
