Rotary Camp Enterprise

On November 6-8. 2025, I was honored to serve as a Mentor at Rotary Camp Enterprise, a three-day camp for high school juniors and seniors. The camp is sponsored by the Edina Rotary Club and the Edina Morningside Rotary Club. Camp Enterprise is designed to introduce students to the free enterprise system and encourage entrepreneurship and ethical business practices.  My greatest takeaway of this event is to report that the state of our future is in good hands with the youth of today!

Any longtime reader of this blog will recognize my commitment to Rotary, Rotary Youth Leadership Awards, and many other Rotary Youth Programs. This was my first visit to Camp Enterprise since I attended as a student sometime around 1976, so it was a full circle for me. My intent was to serve – following the Rotary International theme of “Service Above Self” – but to also learn lessons that we could use for my own district’s Camp RYLA that takes place every Spring. Our next Camp RYLA will take place April 24-28, 2026 at YMCA Camp St. Croix in Hudson, Wisconsin.

I was assigned as a Mentor to a group of seven inspiring young entrepreneurs. The team of four girls and three boys came from Eden Prairie, Edina, Minnetonka, Osseo, Park Center IB World, Prior Lake, and Roseville high schools. These students did not know each other but quickly bonded as a team. Together with my co-leader and team’s counselor, Charlie Sprague, we marveled as the group grew as a team over a couple seemingly long days.

The curriculum was robust. It started with some team building outdoor activities, where the team needed to work together to accomplish tasks. These tasks were expertly run and monitored by the Camp Courage staff and it was here that the students really started to learn about each other. On that first day it was obvious that this team didn’t have major personality problems that often torpedo teams and that they were going to be adept at supporting each other. My job and Charlie’s job were going to be easy!

We eagerly returned to the warm comforts of the conference center on that cold November afternoon to a lesson on understanding one’s self and others. We discussed core purpose, core beliefs, and core values. Using a simplified DiSC assessment, students self-identified their primary personality styles. They then chose their C-suite roles for the rest of the weekend and received an overview of the weekend’s project.

The project was a shark-tank-like scenario where the teams come up with a new idea – a new product or service – prepare a business plan to sell that product or service, and to present that business plan to a group of “venture capitalist” judges. Each group was assigned various focus areas. Our team was assigned to come up with a product or service related to ecological integrity.

The final two tasks of day one were for students to attend break-out with real experts on their assigned role(s) and to get started on their project. I led the breakout for those who had the role as General Counsel. As was the case with my Team 7 group, those “aspiring” General Counsel students were quite impressive! They took their roles seriously and peppered me with quite relevant questions for nearly an hour.

Some groups had a hard time coming up with their idea – and many postponed that until the next day. Our group didn’t encounter that problem. Instead, they brainstormed multiple ideas and quickly honed in on their product before the end of the session. That left coming up with a name for the product, building their business case, and preparing a professional presentation for the venture capitalists.

Day two started with a deep dive on the creation of a proper business case. What questions to ask? What research is needed? What were our blind spots? Who is our target customer? What makes us unique? What are the key tasks in our timeline? Can we prove likely profit? Have we considered everything? We adjourned back to our team rooms to consider all we learned and started in earnest to put together the business case.

The remainder of the day included another speaker to discuss presentation styles/hints and a couple of intense working sessions before the students were released early for fellowship around a fire pit with music and smores. From all reports I received, there was not nearly enough sleep that night. That was less due to extended decompression around the bonfire, but more due to worry and concern about the next morning’s presentations.

I’ve heard it said that a great majority of people fear public speaking more than death. I’m not sure the accuracy of that, but there was a lot of trepidation in camp around their presentations. One of the requirements for a positive score was for everyone on the team to participate in the presentation. I also heard more than one person second guessing their teams’ choice of a product.

Despite the various fears, the presentations I witnessed on Saturday morning were fantastic. All were quite different, but each group did an excellent job explaining and justifying their product or service to the volunteer “venture capitalist” board. My group was wonderful! Even though I provided little in support, I truly felt like a proud papa throughout the presentation. The team rose the occasion and provided their best version of the presentation when it really counted.

We were all disappointed with the final votes were tallied and our group did not win the competition. The event did, though, reaffirm my great hope for the future. The students in my group – and the 120+ high school students I encountered throughout camp – were very impressive. They are intense, caring, intelligent, curious, and fun-loving. I highly recommend this type of service to anyone. You will likely gain even more than the students you serve!

Thank you Camp Director Michael Birdman, all the Edina Rotarians, all the Rotary Clubs who sponsored students, camp sponsors, speakers, all the counselors and my fellow mentors, but mostly to all the students who took this task very seriously and proved they could have a lot of fun in the process.