Students from Tigers Inc. at Loveland High School, with their teacher Craig Murnan (on the far right), after registering to vote on January 9.
Loveland, Ohio – “It was every bit of what Mr. LaRose expressed in that tweet,” said Craig Murnan, business teacher at Loveland High. “The students led a presentation about their business venture, received their Ohio nonprofit status and made sure to become registered voters while they were in the office. They are very much leaders by example and I couldn’t be more pleased with how they prepared for and carried out their meeting with the Secretary.”
The students in Mr. Murnan’s class Tigers Inc. at Loveland High School (LHS) had the opportunity to meet with and present to Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose on January 9. Following their meeting, LaRose tweeted “High School students here in Ohio taking advantage of the easy process to start a business…Thanks for filing with our office and stopping by to talk about your new LHS Tigers Inc. nonprofit… And of course, every student left our office a registered voter!”
Tigers Inc. was launched last fall as one component in the district’s effort to expand programming and courses at Loveland High School. Mr. Murnan, who worked for Ernst & Young LLP in the audit and financial consulting field, but changed career paths and became an educator.
The class motto is “Learning by experience, from experience”.
As an Ohio nonprofit, Tigers Inc. will strive to collaborate with the community and partner with professionals to find tangible solutions to problems, all the while, the students are given the opportunity to network and advance their business acumen.
Currently Tigers Inc. is the umbrella organization for three separate “cohorts”: Marketing, Strategic Project Management, and Wealth Management. More cohorts are being considered as additions. Running Tigers Inc. like an actual, traditional business allows students to apply their developing knowledge and skills across a range of areas. For example, the students have created a website (https://www.tigersinc.org/), established bylaws, appointed a board of directors, created fundraising strategies and much more. Last year, students in the wealth management cohort placed 1st and 7th in the National Stock Market Challenge by Personal Finance Lab.
“The project-based learning component is what makes this such a compelling program for the students,” said Murnan. “It’s a real-world focused class, where we work with real-world business people, who step up to mentor and guide these students forward to gain the skills they need once they leave high school and college.”
