Shark Tank

This semester I have been in an algebra 2 class and we just finished one of two projects they do during the school year. I'm sure by the title of the blog you can guess what the project was. The project was Shark Tank. Students were split up into groups of 3 or 4. Each group had to assign roles to each student which would tell them what part of the project they were responsible for. There was the Director of Marketing who is in charge of the groups advertisements, Director of Finance who is in charge of the graph for the group, and Director of Sales who is in charge of the PowerPoint used to present to the sharks. Once they were in their groups they needed to come up with a product that they wanted to sell. The product needed to be something that could actually be invented or that the technology needed to make it had already been invented. They would work on this project in steps for two weeks and present to the sharks after that. 

Some of the math they had to do was to first figure out their costs. They had to decide on how much space they needed and the cost of rent ($12 per square feet), the number of workers ($10 x number of workers x 40 hours x 4 weeks), and the type of advertisement they wanted. These had a cost already set for them, but they needed to decide which one based on the cost. For example, for advertising, they could choose a Radio advertisement ($200), Billboard advertisement ($1000), or a TV advertisement ($2000). All of these costs would give them their fixed cost per month. Students also needed to figure out how much money it would cost to make one of their product. They had to research each item and come up with a cost to make their product (variable cost). These two prices would give them their cost equation which is the variable cost times x plus their fixed cost. Once they had their cost equation they needed to make a revenue equation as well. They had to decide how much they were going to sell their product for to make a profit. They could change any of the fixed costs along the way if they thought their costs would be to high. Once they had both of these equations they had to graph them to see how long it would take for them to make a profit and their break even point. 

Students really got into this project. Students were talking about this project as if they were actually going to make these items. This was great to see because it showed their passion for their product. Students had to make calculations and equations but were focused on how they could make their product better. Some groups complained about all the math but I think that most groups did not even realize how much math they were actually doing. Students came up with numbers that made their profits reasonable and were quite high. I think students realized that opening a business was hard but it was possible.

At the end of the two weeks I had the opportunity to be a shark and listen to a few presentations. Some groups struggled a little with the numbers and presentation but I was surprised with some of the products students came up with. Most groups came up with a product that either had something to do with their phone or with food. This honestly didn't surprise me but I did think that most of the products would be quite useful if they were actual products. I ended up "investing" in 4 out of the 5 products that I saw. The sharks were great as well. Not only did the students get into the project I think the sharks did as well. After getting to participate in the project I would definitely love to incorporate it into my class one day. Students loved it and I think it was a nice break from the "normal" class day.