The Blue Jackets can be source of inspiration for just about everything, including a high school club.
Just ask a pair of students at Olentangy High School in Lewis Center, who are headed to California because of a project involving the local hockey team.
Sofia Kekalainen – yes, the daughter of former CBJ general manager Jarmo Kekalainen – and Rylan Smith used the Blue Jackets as the theme of their project for Olentangy’s DECA club, a high school and college organization designed to give students a chance to gain experience in the areas of business, entrepreneurship and leadership.
Starting in October, Kekalainen and Smith worked on their project involving the Blue Jackets ticketing department, putting together an entrant that finished in first place in the state of Ohio in the category of sports and entertainment.
That advances the two high schoolers to the national DECA competition, which will be held this weekend in California. That’s a testament to the hard work the two high school juniors have put in over the last six months.
“For months, this project was literally like our baby,” Kekalainen said. “We worked so hard on it. All the effort we put in, it was a lot.
“Actually seeing it come together was really cool."
As part of the project, Kekalainen and Smith interviewed CBJ vice president of ticket sales and service Marty Mulford as well as director of human resources Brittany Lenzo about hiring and training processes for the ticketing department. In addition, they sent out surveys for employees to fill out about their experiences working in the department.
The project found that staff members felt valued and believed they worked in a positive environment. Opportunities for improvement came in the realms of internal communication and work-life balance – areas any sports organization could address given the fast-paced nature of the job.
“It started with just doing some background research into the Blue Jackets and the business that goes on behind the team,” Kekalainen said. “And then we set up an interview with Marty Mulford, and we sent out a survey to all the current employees and got as many responses as we could. From all that information, we gathered what we could and gained a better understanding of the ticketing department to find something, not necessarily bad, but something we could try to fix in our research project.
“We got to talk to Brittany Lenzo from human resources and talked to Mr. Mulford, and it was just really cool communicating on a more mature level for us. This is one of our first experiences where we get to be in such a real-world environment, and such a rare experience like this was really cool for us.”
As part of the project, Kekalainen and Smith put together a 20-page report on the subject as well as a presentation that was delivered to judges at the state level over a two-day competition. Olentangy High School has an impressive DECA program – Kekalainen's sister Emilia took part before heading to Miami University, while Smith joined because of what she had heard about the valuable experiences within the program – and so far the response has been impressive.
“The feedback that we got for our project on the second day was that we had just the right amount of information,” Smith said.
The DECA International Career Development Conference (ICDC) that the two will be attending in Anaheim is the culmination of the year for the program. More than 23,000 high school students, teachers/advisors, business professionals and alumni gather for not just competition but learning opportunities.
So often, the best memories and opportunities for development during the high school and college years come outside of the everyday classroom, and Kekalainen and Smith have found just that with their winning experience in DECA.
“It’s been really fun,” Smith said. “I didn’t realize how much that I had learned from this project. You don’t do notes and tests in this class; we learn from experience. I feel like I've learned a lot, and it’s been really fun – especially when we got first. That was fun.”
We wish the best of luck to Sofia and Rylan at finals this weekend in California! We’re grateful that you chose our wonderful sport as inspiration for your award-winning project.
