Herriman High School has always been successful, but one of its most recent triumphs came from the outstanding Business Department. Last year, Marin Murdock, Keenan Budd, and Hannah Pedersen competed in the American Enterprise Project for FBLA. This project focuses on promoting the Free Enterprise System in your community. They decided to shoot for the stars and created the Herriman charter of the Southwest Valley Chamber of Commerce, which has opened the door for new opportunities for this year’s business department.

Among the notable and incredible people that Murdock, Budd and Pedersen worked with were Senator Mike Lee, and Mayor Carmen Freeman. They created a board of members to help continue the charter when their project was over to make sure that it was in good hands.

They were extremely successful, and ended up taking first in the nation at the National Leadership Conference over the summer in Atlanta, Georgia. They made Herriman proud, as well as the state of Utah and the FBLA program. Murdock, the student representative of the Herriman Charter, explained that,

“We [the business students] were personally invited to the Utah Solutions Summit by Senator Mike Lee. Fourteen of our students from FBLA and DECA went to this summit where my partners and I were recognized for our work to start the Herriman Chamber of Commerce.

This Chamber is run by city officials and business professionals throughout the community, however we have a student representative, which is myself, serve on the board each year to give a student point of view for the growing community and help bring in businesses to the area.

Through this chamber work we are able to support businesses and increase Herriman’s representation on the state level. “As a result of the success of this project and of Herriman Business, Senator Mike Lee invited the officers of Herriman DECA and FBLA to the 3rd annual Utah Solutions Summit.” 

At the Utah Solutions Summit, they were recognized for their achievement in front of elite business professionals and celebrated for their contribution to their community. “It was an awesome experience being recognized by the senator in his keynote address, and I look forward to the great prospects that this project continues to have into the next school year”, said Murdock.

Business students were invited to another summit a few weeks prior to the Utah Solutions Summit that was put on by the local municipalities and Jordan School District. This summit was a meeting that involved several boards, including five local mayors, who met to discuss the expansion of their community and to brainstorm about future changes to the community.

Many of our business students hope to someday attend summits like this as members of those boards, making the invitation to observe the Summit even more exciting. The meeting also acted as research for this year’s new DECA and FBLA projects.

This whole experience was a wonderful learning experience for the future business leaders that our Mustangs are. Julianna Wing, the awesome FBLA advisor said, “I think it’s really awesome that we have Mustangs in our midst that are working hard to really try and prepare themselves for what happens beyond high school”. We couldn’t agree more, and are proud of our fellow Mustangs and the accomplishments that they are achieving to better themselves and their community.