The 12.7 cm Hot Dog CorporationAuthor(s): Hope MartinSource: The Arithmetic Teacher, Vol. 36, No. 5 (January 1989), pp. 12-13Published by: National Council of Teachers of MathematicsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41194413 .

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The 1 2.7 cm Hot Dog Corporation By Hope Martin

A corporation was formed in the United States fourteen years ago that does not appear on the New York Stock Exchange or any other. It is alive and well and prospering at Northwood Junior High School in Highland Park, Illinois. The "12.7 cm Hot Dog Corporation" is owned and operated by a group of about for- ty-five eighth graders, who make all the executive decisions concerning the sale of hot dogs, chips, soda pop, and popcorn at home boys' and girls' basketball games and wrestling meets. I started the corporation to bring "real life" into the classroom and encourage students to use their math- ematics skills to make the decisions necessary to run a successful busi- ness.

At the beginning of each school year, an announcement is made that shares of stock in the 12.7 cm Hot Dog Corporation are on sale for $3.00 a share. Any interested eighth grader can purchase one share of stock. The sale of stock takes about two weeks. The 12.7 cm Hot Dog Corporation has become a "legend," and great interest is expressed on the part of the stu- dents. It is not unusual for in excess of 50 percent of the eighth graders to become shareholders. When the sale of stock is completed, a meeting of the members of the corporation is held to assess the amount of capital available

Hope Martin teaches eighth-grade mathemat- ics in Highland Park, IL 60035. In addition, she teaches graduate workshops through St. Xavier College and the National College of Education in "Real Life Mathematics'* and "Art and Math."

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to fund the corporation. Since the treasury contains no money prior to the sale of stock, the financial status of the corporation is dependent on the number of members, or shareholders. A treasurer is elected to keep a record of the stockholders, keep the ledger

Students learn many things besides mathematical skills.

that contains the expenses and re- ceipts, maintain a list of the "whole- sale prices," and keep track of the "work records" of the shareholders. I conduct the meetings and oversee the project; I also supervise at each of the sales.

Members of the corporation are as- signed to find the "wholesale prices" of each of the items to be sold, and a date is set for them to report back to the corporate members, usually about a week hence.

When the members have all the prices, they decide on the percentage

of profit they wish to make and set the "retail price" of each of the items. Since each member owns only one share of stock, every shareholder has an equal vote at the meetings. Once the final votes have been taken, ar- rangements are made to purchase, de- liver, and store the supplies.

A committee is formed to publicize when the hot-dog sales will begin. Students' efforts have varied from dramatic closed-circuit-TV ads to posters in the school hallways.

Before each event, a sign-up sheet is posted on which members of the corporation volunteer for setup (pre- paring for the sale), fifteen-minute work shifts (three members to a shift), and cleanup. Six shifts are needed for each event. Each member is expected to shoulder his or her burden of the work load. In addition to the mathe- matical skills of percentage, profit, and loss, the members learn the re- sponsibility that each participant has to the group. A member who cannot work a shift must find a replacement so that the shift will be covered. The students take this responsibility very seriously, and it is rare that a shift does not have the proper coverage. Corporation members keep track of the shifts and automatically cover for a person who has failed to appear for a shift. The students have handled these problems very nicely.

Each sale has a cashier who is re- sponsible for collecting the money from the customers and giving the correct change. After the sale, the cashier leaves a cash reserve in the money box; the remainder is counted and a deposit slip made out for the bank (the school office).

Arithmetic Teacher

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When the selling season is con- cluded at the end of February, the members vote on what they would like to buy for the school with the profits. They understand that the school has provided them with the facilities to run their business with no overhead expenses and that the profits will be used to purchase some- thing for the school. Over the years, they have voted to purchase class- room sets of calculators, a metric lab for the media center, programmable calculators for use by the special ed- ucation department, sports equipment to be used at the lunch hours, and games and puzzles for the mathemat- ics classrooms. At this time they vote on what they want to do with their initial investment of $3.00 each. They can elect to have it returned to them, although they never have. Junior high school students love parties and food, and so most of the time they vote to go on a picnic or have a pizza party. We're trying to get tickets to a Cubs baseball game this year.

Through this project, the students learn many things besides the obvious acquisition of mathematics skills. They develop a sense of belonging to a group. They want their business to be the "most successful of all time" and to make a record profit. They learn a sense of responsibility in a real-life situation. Their wise manage- ment and the degree of their invest- ment of time and energy contribute to the success or failure of the business. In most years, the corporation has averaged about $500.00 profit. The average afternoon sale grosses about $60.00, and half of this amount is profit. The most money any corpora- tion has ever made is $850.00, but that group expanded their offerings and sponsored "McDonald's Days" dur- ing the lunch hours. One year the corporation went bankrupt; they "ate the profits." This experience has served as a valuable lesson to suc- ceeding corporations.

Each year I become more excited about the idea and the value that it has for youngsters. It is truly a real-life experience that has been a marvelous addition to my mathematics program. w

January 1989

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