Reaching students on a level that resonates with their interests and personal learning styles can be tricky, but for those who learn by doing, a series of classes being offered at Huntington Beach High School is so BaD it’s good.
A Business and Design program at Huntington Beach High lets students apply the principles of innovation, design thinking and entrepreneurship to classroom standards like U.S. history and even algebra, leading them down a pathway toward starting their own businesses by their senior year.
Not content to confine themselves to the classroom, BaD students can be found producing podcasts in a studio they designed and decorated, or shooting photos and videos all over campus.
Huntington Beach High students work in a design lab, part of the school’s Business and Design program.
(Courtesy of BaD)
The curriculum even takes teens out into the business world, including a project last spring that had juniors collaborating with professional designers to create a clothing line now for sale at Jack’s Surfboards on Main Street.
HBHS teacher Nick Schwab, who developed the program, said the concept sprung into being as he transitioned in 2012 from teaching history and social sciences to photography.
In that role, he developed a budding photography and digital design program that allowed students to shoot professional-grade photos of sports teams, both at HBHS and on other campuses, and learn video production as they produced content for clients.
Over time, the enterprise grew into a business that last year generated $100,000 of revenue for scholarships, equipment and other program needs. Students became so passionate about the work, it hardly seemed like learning at all.
“We want to create a space and platform for kids who maybe want to learn in a different way and learn some new stuff,” the teacher said of the endeavor.
The success of the photo business got Schwab thinking of other ways he and his teaching colleagues might inspire similar levels of enthusiasm by applying multidisciplinary, project-based learning to other subjects.
And practically no subject is off limits. Schwab has taught kids U.S. history through the lens of media and design and has enlisted colleagues in the math department to lead classes such as algebra and geometry by design.
“Math is not always students’ favorite subject,” the teacher said in an interview Wednesday. “So we thought there could be a better return on investment if we could alter a traditional math curriculum and find different ways to teach those skills and engage students.”
Students’ interest in the newly-packaged lessons led in 2022 to the creation of the Business and Design program, which is focused on teaching enrollees the business basics — nurturing a germ of an idea into a product or service, testing the market and refining as they go, then marketing, selling and managing that nascent business.
A collaboration between Huntington Beach retailer Jack’s Surfboards and students in Huntington Beach High’s Business and Design program led to the creation of a clothing line on sale at the shop.
(Courtesy of Meleah Benedict)
Most of the heavy lifting is done in participants’ junior year — when they pick up foundational career skills working in the photo and design business while also learning about historical events, leaders and innovators and what made them tick — and in a senior entrepreneurship class, where the teens develop, pitch and publicize a product or service.
HBHS senior Sami Scot, who came to the campus her junior year and immediately enrolled in the BaD program for its emphasis on marketing, appreciates being able to create and innovate outside a classroom setting.
“Not a lot of schools offer a program like this,” the 17-year-old Huntington Beach resident said Thursday. “It’s really great being out in the real world at 16 or 17. These are things we’re actually going to do as adults in the real world — why not do them now?”
A student model shows off a T-shirt design created by students of Huntington Beach High’s Business and Design program.
(Courtesy of Meleah Benedict)
While it’s not yet a fully-fledged career technical education (CTE) pathway, BaD’s courses all connect with one another by focusing on critical thinking, collaboration, communication and creativity. So far, about 200 students have engaged in the program, according to Schwab.
“We’re still in the early stages of tying all the ideas together but we’ve had incredible responses from students, parents and, most excitingly, from local businesses and organizations,” he said.
Case in point: When Schwab reached out to Jack’s Surfboards last spring to see if members of the company’s design team might offer insights for an in-class lesson, discussions quickly progressed into a full-blown collaboration to have students create their own line of shirts to be sold online and in Jack’s Huntington Beach headquarters.
Siena Goggia, a graphic designer with Jack’s, said the company often joins forces with local organizations, such as the city’s police and fire departments, to create products geared toward local audiences. So, when staff heard about BaD, they were all on board.
Jack’s Surfboards in Huntington Beach recently collaborated with Huntington Beach High School students on a clothing line now for sale at the shop.
(Fernando Lopez)
“We thought it was a great opportunity to highlight the kids, Goggia said. “Most of the collaborations we do are for the community — that’s definitely a big win for us.”
Five teams digitally created the designs and pitched to Schwab, then presented their products to Goggia and other Jack’s employees who, after making some refining suggestions, liked the finished products so much they agreed to sell all five shirts, both at Jack’s Main Street flagship and online at jackssurfboards.com.
“There’s been a good response from the community — Huntington Beach in general is a pretty strong community, and everyone loves it here so people love supporting it,” Goggia said of the HBHS line. “We’re hoping to do more collaborations [with BaD] as the program continues to grow.”
For Scot, who also serves as the news lead on Huntington Beach High’s journalism team, the BaD program is about much more than fashion; it’s changed the way she looks at school. She even chronicled her experience in a Sept. 2 article published in the campus’ online magazine, “Slick.”
“The reason why we take this class is because we genuinely love it,” the teen said. “We’re not doing it for a grade or our transcripts — it’s because we love it.”
A model displays a hoodie created by students in Huntington Beach High School’s Business and Design program.
(Courtesy of Meleah Benedict)