Global experiences paying off for students

Connection program part of Junior Achievement

The educations of 15 high school students from Wallingford and one from Cheshire are taking on a global flavor as the Connecticut teenagers play host 20 students from Shanghai, China.

The students are part of Junior Achievement Global Connection program that was launched in Connecticut three years ago. The first year, students from China spent a weekend in Connecticut, with Wallingford students visiting China last summer.

After visiting the state Capitol Monday, the Chinese students and their hosts spent the day at Yale University listening to New Haven-area entrepreneurs and trying to develop ideas for new products that they can develop and trade with their foreign counterparts, said Lou Golden, president of Junior Achievement of Southwest New England.

“The main part of what they did on Tuesday was research over the Internet to determine what might make good products and then analyze the data they got,” Golden said.

The students met with three entrepreneurs:

• Paul Dupervil, owner of Hamden-based Real Property Management of Southern Connecticut.

• Peter Kozodoy, chief strategy officer for Gem Advertising in New Haven.

• Onyeka Obiocha, president of Happy LIfe Coffee, which has coffee roasting operations in Wallingford.

Golden said students asked the trio of entrepreneurs how they got involved in their respective businesses, what the biggest risks of starting a business are and what it is about their work that gives them the most satisfaction

Obiocha said the students “are awesome and asked amazing questions.”

“When I was their age, I knew that I would work for myself, but I didn’t know in what aspect (of the business world),” he said. “I thought I would do something corporate.”

Golden said while the Chinese students are in Connecticut, they are split into six teams, each with a mix of teenagers from both countries.

By Friday, they will have developed two products to trade, he said.

Work will continue for the students during this school year — both here and in China— as the teenagers learn about things such as marketing plans and what is involved in the import and export process. Golden said Anne Evans, director of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Export Assistance Center in Middletown, is on the Junior Achievement board of directors in Connecticut and will be involved in explaining to the students how foreign trade works,

The students and their Connecticut hosts will visit an Otis Elevator test facility in Bristol Wednesday and then Lake Compounce amusement park, Golden said. Thursday’s schedule includes a visit to the Westfarms Mall in West Hartford and a New Britain Rock Cats game, he said.

Salvatore Menzo, Wallingford’s Superintendent of Schools, said some of the district’s graduating seniors this spring were the first participants in the Global Connection program.

“I know that all of them are exploring opportunities in business in some shape or form,” Menzo said. “And as group, they have remained very close fromthe trip they took last summer to China.”