From the Field to the Front Office

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  For many students, it is hard to see how school connects to the real world. Not upstairs in Gunston 214 for Sports and Entertainment Marketing, where West Po students, many of who are also athletes, are guided by Mr. Michael Carfang (Coach Carfang) as they take a look at how marketing is used in the sports and entertainment worlds.  

   When describing the class, Carfang made sure to emphasize the entertainment part of the class. One large misconception of the class is that it’s a class about just sports. It’s really a marketing class that teaches students how marketing can be used in the entertainment and sports industries. Carfang describes the class throughout the year as a “living organism.” What happens in each class is different—aside from the projects—and it changes from year to year. 

   A normal day of class is split up into two parts. The first part, when everyone is seated and awaiting instruction, is a group discussion about recent events in the sports and entertainment world, West Po or specifically in the class. The topic of the discussions vary from being about a recent football game to the release of the newest hit movies such as Joker. The second part is for working on one of the many projects students will do throughout the year. Projects are started with Carfang giving a “problem” to the class. The students are then given the resources to solve the problem. Finally, the students present their solution to the problem in front of the class. Senior Greyson Buchannan says, “The class has a really chill environment where I can come in and not be stressed.”

   According to Carfang, the most popular project is the Fantasy Football project. For the project, students partner up and take the roles of owners of an expansion team in the NFL. Using a class Fantasy Football draft, they create a presentation that showcases their team and why the commissioner should allow their team to join the league. Part of the reason why it’s so fun is because “after the project is done, we can still enjoy our fantasy football teams and compete with each other,” says senior Michael Devlin.