These Kids are Amazing!

 

1.  E-mail us and tell us all about your situation.  You can ask us as many questions as you would like. 

2.  Send us contact information for the principal at your school, or the president of your parent association- we'll take it from there.

3.  Request a "Promo Pack" and we'll send you plenty of information plus a free DVD that will help you get others on board.

Here's an entrepreneurial story about a woman who is creating the kind of toys she wishes she had when she was a girl. With the scholarships and benefits for young women who enter the engineering fields- this child's toy is a great product idea.

Link to video of Debbie's product idea and inspiration

Meet Abby

My name is Abby, and I am a 6th grader at Reverend Brown School.  When I first joined TREP$, I wanted to make duct taped headbands.  I had already made some for myself.  Many of my friends thought they were cool. Then, my mom told me to think about things that I am good at and like to do.  I love to draw and sketch more than anything in the world.  I had already made cartoon drawings of my brother, sister and I for our Christmas card and everyone loved it.  

I planned to work out a system where people can place orders for drawings and pay at the Marketplace.  I made a poster board showing drawings of pictures that I did with the original photos next to them.  I also made business cards (the size of postcards, so people don't lose them) which showed example photos and drawings and information about my business.  I made a website and email account to support my business.  In addition, I made a slideshow of all my drawings and how much the drawing would cost.  I decided to make the drawings $5.00 for a 4x6 and $12.00 for a 8x10 because of the amount of work, cost of paper, and pencils used to make it.  It was inexpensive enough for people to purchase while at the marketplace.  I plan to continue my business by asking my customers for referrals once I have delivered my drawing to them.  I also plan to do TREP$ next year and improve on what I have started.

The marketplace was a lot of fun!  People were very friendly and came up to everyone's table.  When people saw my drawings they were surprised that a girl in 6th grade could draw that well.  I didn't believe that people would like my drawing that much.  It made me feel great!  I made nearly $50.00 in profit and now have 9 drawings to make and send to my costumers.  To save money, I will be delivering the drawings in hard envelopes through school.  I think my friends are really impressed that I can handle my own small business.  My dad suggested that I not only make a realistic drawing of each photo but also give my customers a cartoon drawing as well to help promote my business.  

Without TREP$ I would have never tried this on my own or even have known how much everyone loves my drawings!

Meet Corbin

My name is Corbin Mills. I go to school at Reverend Brown in Sparta, NJ. I am 11 years old, and in 6th grade. I really enjoy working with computers and learning how they work.
So for my Trep$ Business I decided to make a smart phone app. I named my company Corcrom Apps.
 
Making a smart phone app is a very complex process. I decided to make an app for the Android platform. In order to do this I needed to learn the Java computer programming language. I got books from the library and bought a few on my computer. I also watched many tutorials online. I spent many hours watching enough to have a basic understanding of how the language work. I learned that Android has something called open-source code. Open source code is free downloadable example programs that help you learn about how to make a program, in this case an app.
 
I thought about what type of game to make. I tried different apps, but not all of them were fun, and most  of them were incomplete or did not work. Finally I found a book that told me how to make my game that I sold. The game was a game called Snake. I built the framework of the game, but I had not come up with a theme for it. I am interested in politics, and I am following the election, so I thought it would be a good idea to make the game be about the presidential election. The game Presidential Train was born!
 
I purchased a $25 developer's license from Google, and posted my app on the Android Market. For $.99 anyone with an Android Phone can buy it.
 
There are 2 versions of the app, a democrat version, and a republican version: the Republican version features Mitt Romney, while the Democrat version features President Obama. The goal of the game is to go around the screen looking for money for the campaign. You collect dollar signs, and when you do they add on to your tail, and each one gives you 10 points.You try to collect as many dollars and get as many points as you can. The engine of the train is Romney's face, or Obama's face. You try to avoid running into yourself. If you do you lose the game. Show your friends how good you are in the High Scores menu.
 
At the Marketplace I had a posterboard set up showing information about my company and my app. I had my computer open to the Android Market with my app page on there open. Many people stopped by my booth to see what I was doing. I explained how I wrote my app to them. Most people with a droid bought it! For those people without droids I sold cookies in the shape of a droid . They were both a hit!   
      
Please take a look at my app! On the Android Market, which is now Google Play, search for Republican or Democrat Presidential Train. It will come up and say Corcrom underneath the icon, and the name of the app.

Trep$ was a rewarding experience. I look forward to doing it again next year!

Meet Charlie

My name is Charlie Parker. I am 12 years old, and I am in 6th grade. I live in Bloomingdale NJ and this year I like many others participated in TREPS. Now if you don't know what TREPS is, it is when all the kids in the school get to make and sell an item. You can chose not to participate in the event and the night of the marketplace you get to go and buy the products for sale.

When I first heard about it I thought it sounded like a lot of fun. So knowing me I had to sign up. After 4 workshops I had 3 good ideas on what to sell 1:I would have a raffle and the winner would get a prize 2: I would have a rubber band stand where I would sell all kinds of rubber band toys 3: I would draw eyes on glasses ( I tried this and it looked very funny ). I narrowed down which one I would sell, I chose to make the glasses.

My family and I worked hard and made 50 glasses over about 1 week. It was then time for the marketplace I did not think I would do so well, but it turns out that I sold out and made $85. This was a great experience and hope I have the chance to do it again. If you have the opportunity to be involved in this great program I highly recommend it.

Meet Carla

My name is Carla A. Ospina, I am a 6th grader at Walter T. Bergen Middle School and I participated in TREP$ this past March. I named my business "Carla's Wooly Jewelry". What I created was wool jewelry; it is jewelry made out of strands of wool made into balls. I made earrings, bracelets, necklaces, rings, hair clips, headbands and pins. I got the idea of doing this product with my grandmother who by the way is very artistic and loves anything that has to do with crafts.
The process of making one little ball was a bit complicated. To make one little ball usually takes about 4 to 6 minutes, it depends how large or tiny you want to make the wool ball for the piece of jewelry you are working on. One of the biggest challenges I faced was finishing on time. The fact that I worked by myself with some help from my grandmother was still a lot of work. The best part was when I made a lot of balls of all different colors and sizes and started to create the jewelry by making sets of earrings with matching bracelets, necklaces and  rings sets, and beautiful hair clips; some of the jewelry had my school colors. It started to look very pretty.

I created a signature logo for my business which is a flirty eyes sheep face (since wool comes from sheep) wearing a pair of earrings and a necklace. All my advertisements posters had this logo as well as my purchasing bags. When the day the TREP$ Marketplace came I was very interested to see how people were going to like my products and if I was going to have good sales; there was a lot of booths with very nice products.  When people came up to my booth they said that they were very impressed with the skills that I had shown and thought I did a great job. I ended up making about $50 dollars after I paid off my loans in order to start-up my business.

At the end of the marketplace I said to myself that I really enjoyed this opportunity to do TREP$ and it was a fun learning experience. I think that later in life I may continue to do my business and sell my beautiful products; I was very successful. I feel proud that people noticed how good of an entrepreneur I am, to have this opportunity to be part of this news letter for thousands of people to read, and learn about my successful business.  I say that if you have not joined TREP$ yet you should. This program is a lot of fun and is easy to do all you need is time and an idea.

Anthony Wayne Middle School

North Brookfield Elementary School

Valley View Elementary School
Long Pond School

Warren Point Elementary School

St Phillip Elementary School

St Catherine Elementary School

Stanlick Elementary School

Kaleidoscope Learning Center

Bragg School

 

The TREP$
Family of Schools