The Impact of Small Business

Heritage Bank Challenges GO CAPS Students to Think Like Entrepreneurs

Programs like the Greater Ozarks Centers for Advanced Professional Studies (GO CAPS) are so important for high school students. There is tremendous value in what students learn in a traditional classroom, but there is another level of learning that happens when students are given the opportunity to apply those lessons to real-world situations. GO CAPS creates those opportunities by connecting students with experiences, people and challenges that help them better understand what life after high school can look like.

For students who may not yet know exactly what they want their future to look like, experiences like this can open a door. A student may discover an interest in business, marketing, public speaking or entrepreneurship. Another may realize they enjoy solving problems, working with a team or developing creative solutions. Even if none of those interests ultimately become a career, the experience itself builds confidence and practical skills that students can carry with them.

That is something we believe is worth investing in.

Why Heritage Bank Invests in Our Schools

We believe investing in our schools is an investment in the future of our communities.

As a community bank, we have a unique perspective on the relationship between businesses, schools and the communities they serve. We work with business owners who employ local people, support local organizations and contribute to the economic health and character of our communities. We also know that many of those businesses began with someone who saw a need, developed an idea and decided to take a chance on it.

The students sitting in a GO CAPS classroom could become the people sitting across the table from us as business owners tomorrow. They could become teachers, healthcare professionals, entrepreneurs, farmers, tradespeople, community leaders or employees who bring new ideas and new energy to the businesses that already call our communities home.

Our responsibility as a community business is to help create an environment where young people have opportunities to explore those possibilities.

When we invest our time in programs like GO CAPS, we aren't simply checking a box for community involvement. We are giving students access to experiences and perspectives they may not otherwise have. We are allowing our team members to share what they know from their own careers, while giving students a chance to practice those skills in an environment where they can experiment, make decisions, receive feedback and try again.

We believe those experiences matter.

The Young Entrepreneur & Strong Community Connection

This connection becomes reinforced as the GO CAPS students participate in a workshop conducted by our marketing team.

The exercise began with a simple question: What problem could your business solve?

But by the end of the day, students had to think about much more than the product or service they wanted to sell. They had to consider who they would serve, why their business needed to exist, how it would be different from the competition and what would change in their community because their business was there.

Those are questions every business owner should be asking, but they are also questions that encourage students to look at their communities differently.

Instead of simply seeing a problem, they were asked to see an opportunity.

Instead of asking only, "What could I sell?" they had to ask, "What do people need?"

And instead of thinking only about making money, they were asked to consider the larger purpose of their business and the impact it could have.

The Exercise

By the time each group stood in front of their peers to pitch its final business idea, the students had practiced skills that reach far beyond entrepreneurship.

They had collaborated with their teammates, worked through competing ideas, made decisions, developed a plan, thought strategically about an audience and figured out how to communicate their vision. They had also been asked to think critically about challenges, competition, branding, marketing and long-term goals.
Those skills will serve them whether they eventually own a business or work for someone else.

As marketers, we understand the power of a good story. But our role that day wasn't simply to teach students how to tell a story about a business. We wanted them to understand that every good business story starts with something worth solving, someone worth serving and a reason worth believing in.

We also wanted them to see that they have the ability to be part of that story in their own communities.

The Investment

There is a lot of conversation about preparing students for the future. We believe one of the best ways to do that is to give them opportunities to experience it.

Programs like GO CAPS give students the chance to explore possibilities before they have to make decisions about what comes next. They allow students to interact with people working in different industries, apply what they are learning and begin to understand the connection between their education and the world beyond high school.

For a community bank, being part of that process is a natural fit.

We are in the business of helping people build things. We help individuals purchase homes, help businesses grow, help families plan for the future and work alongside customers as they pursue their goals. We see every day what can happen when someone has an idea, a plan and the determination to see it through.

So when we have an opportunity to encourage young people to develop those same qualities, we believe it is time well spent.

Investing in our schools is ultimately an investment in the people who will shape our communities next.

At Heritage Bank of the Ozarks, we believe being a community bank means more than doing business in a community. It means being part of it.

And sometimes, being part of it means showing up in a classroom, challenging a student to dream a little bigger and helping them see that an idea can become something that makes a difference.