Who better to recruit future students to an entrepreneurship and leadership-focused charter high school situated in the heart of Denver than the school’s students themselves?

Brand Iron has teamed up with Denver Venture School, a first-year public charter school that embraces entrepreneurship and leadership. They have challenged its current student body to design and execute a recruiting plan to attract students for the 2009-10 school year. Teams, or what they call “crews,” made up of 12-15 students will compete against one another in an attempt to bring in the largest number of new student applications.

“We want to have our current scholars be the voice of recruitment,” said DVS Head of School, Ami Desai. “We have a bright and energetic group of scholars who are best suited to encourage other scholars to attend our school.”

The cool part is that the students must take the very entrepreneurial and (business-like) approach of submitting a written recruitment/marketing plan outlining various strategies and tactics, then work together to execute the plan and sign up students. The crews producing the most applications will win an assortment of prizes including Colorado Rockies baseball tickets, iPods and gift certificates. Michael Doyle is currently working with the DVS students and faculty to implement this challenge.

The school’s mission statement is “to enable a diverse group of students to achieve academic, social, and career success by offering a relevant, project-based, entrepreneurship and leadership focused curriculum in a small public school environment.”

They hope to generate at least 160 applications for next year’s freshman class of 120 and at least 80 applications for the 40 available spots for next year’s sophomore class.

Denver Venture School is public charter school that opened in August 2008 and is free to attend and open to all students in the metro Denver area. By 2011 DVS expects to serve approximately 400 students in grades 9 through 12.

Brand Iron is working with Denver Venture School on a pro bono basis.

Written by Jim Miller