The ‘Future Business Leaders of America,’ or FBLA, is a newly reopened student organization at Normal West High School for those seeking opportunities in extracurricular education, experience, and opportunities within the business world.
Joining FBLA is a huge opportunity for aspiring students to explore the business world and to start to understand how it functions.
“As a student-based organization, we, are deeply focused on the opportunities side of things for our members. Our goal is to teach our fellow students the principles of business through competitions, in-person experience, volunteering [etc.],” Normal West FBLA Vice President Emily Parent stated.
Normal West FBLA has big plans going into the rest of this year, specifically focusing on hands-on activities for their members including co-operative work with business classes as well as money handling.
For the volunteering side of things, they plan to volunteer at the Bloomington Baby Fold’s ‘Festival of Trees.’ Being a part of this would offer the possibility of gaining connections within the community as well as all the other perks that come with volunteering at such a popular local event.
For the money handling and business practices side of things, they plan to reopen the school store for any students to buy from.
Though times are still vague and they still have a lot of work to do, the FBLA has huge goals for this year.
“[Alongside volunteering], we are also working on reopening the school store, not only to benefit the students of the school but to offer actual firsthand experience with handling money and things like budgeting in a real setting,” Parent added.
The club’s teacher sponsor, Mr. Cullen Matthews has been deeply involved in the business programs within the school ever since he sponsored the original FBLA club.
Additionally, as the club sponsor, Mr. Matthews is deeply excited to see what opportunities FBLA could provide for the school and its students.
They plan to be a club deeply intertwined in the fabric of West, and as a club, FBLA aims to cooperate with the PTO as well as business classes and Booster Club.
Going forward, FBLA aims to expand and establish more and more opportunities for its members as well as other students at West.
For more information regarding FBLA meeting times, please contact Mr. Matthews, President of FBLA Sahithyaa Balraj, or Vice President of FBLA, Emily Parent.
