CED BLA Shark Tank Competition Highlights Students' Professional Skills
Tensions ran high and the competition was brutal at this year’s Shark Tank competition. Donnie Longenecker’s Professional Practice class brought out the best in several teams of BLA students who competed head-to-head with the goal of designing the strongest business plan for a design firm. The proposed plans had to be creative yet grounded, with real-world potential. To make it more exciting, the winners recevied a travel scholarship to attend the 2022 ASLA conference in San Francisco this upcoming fall.
This year’s panel of “Sharks” included:
- Gib Durden, VP Business Development at HighGrove Partners (BLA 1990)
- Jon Williams, President and CEO at W&A Engineering and Better Communities Collaborative (BLA 1996)
- Madie Fischetti, Studio Director at WLA Studio, ASLA, AICP (MLA, 2001)
The panel also incldued a special appearance by returning winner:
- Adolfo Martinez | Landscape Designer at Smith Planning Group (BLA 2022)
We are proud of all the teams who competed this year who managed to survive the sharks, but a special congratulations to the winning team: LANDSKP created by Mela Xides, Hannah Lee, Macy Khamsa, Cassidy Nix, and Kristin Partlow.
Pictured (left to right): Adolfo Martinez, Madie Fischetti, Hannah Lee, Mela Xides, Kristin Partlow, Macy Khamsa, Jon Williams, Cassidy Nix, Donnie Longenecker, and Gib Durden
LANDSKP is a landscape architecture firm in Frisco, Texas focuces on enriching public spaces. Their ideals rest in creating energetic spaces for the public to feel connected with where they are, and they are a proudly certified Women Owned Business (WBE) committed to emphasizing diversity and inclusion in their work.
This year’s competition was held on the Sun Trust Pitch Deck in Studio 225, home of Terry Business College’s Entrepreneurship Program.
Congratulations to all the students who competed in this year’s competition, and a special thank you to the Sharks for participating.