[MUSIC PLAYING]
-I wasn't expecting this
in our science class.
It's amazing.
-These temperatures
are enough to induce
melting of the asteroid.
-You're learning science, but at
the same time [INAUDIBLE] then
incorporate it into into
a totally different field.
-Like, you're talking
about making a blog?
-It has to be in
connection with their name.
NARRATOR: Can creating a virtual
enterprise improve a student's
understanding of science?
-We had the pressure of
learning the material in order
to make our business successful.
-Perhaps you can come up with
ideas concerning enterprising,
concerning these
remarkable stones.
NARRATOR: In virtual
enterprise classrooms,
students must use their
developing scientific knowledge
to create a business model
for a virtual startup company.
-After we do all
this exploration,
we could actually branch
out to that as well.
-Because we're just not some
company trying to make money.
It'll be backed by science.
-I've already thought about
a pitch that encapsulates
everything we could be.
NARRATOR: Students develop
an idea for a venture,
devise their mission
and structure,
then pitch it to a panel.
-How are you going to
attract your target market?
-There's not a worse
feeling than knowing
that I'm not prepared.
-Make me, with those mineral
ingredients, a mafic rock.
-Having the VE element gave
me more of a desire to learn.
-If you can dream it,
and you believe it,
you can definitely do it.
ALL: Take you from the
ordinary to the extraordinary.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
KIEREN HOWARD: To use meteorites
to understand how planets form,
how life form, we
obviously need samples.
NARRATOR: At Kingsborough
Community College,
students in an
earth science class
create a virtual enterprise
by combining business skills
with scientific knowledge.
-So we're gonna have really
high energy environments.
My priority is the
core course content.
-All right, so it looks like
a combination of them all.
For me, it's the business
making the science interesting.
But at the end of the day, if
the business isn't successful,
I still take the
learning aspect of it.
NARRATOR: Today,
students brainstorm
ways to use meteorites as the
foundation of their business.
-After hearing about
how meteorites form,
we had so many ideas.
-This is a rock that
came from outer space,
and who would be into that?
I really didn't know much about
meteorites before the class.
-All right, good morning, class.
Welcome back.
So last week we
were dealing mostly
with looking at the
origins of our universe.
Forming around young stars,
or young stellar objects,
we have all the
leftover material
from that molecular cloud,
which falls down and ends up
being entrained in rotation
around the young object.
And we call this disk
of material-- this gas
and dusty material--
the protoplanetary disk.
-A meteorite is a
piece of an asteroid
that has fallen to earth.
And it's only a meteorite
when it's actually on earth.
-Dight the meteorite,
using radioactive decay,
and come up with an age
for our solar system.
-We did learn how planets formed
out of the Big Bang Theory,
and how asteroids and
meteorites play a part in that.
-One of the unifying
properties of all meteorites.
Of course they all contain
metal because they're all
at least a little bit magnetic.
-I didn't even think about
meteorites prior to this class.
If I'm never intrigued
about something,
I just lose interest.
So this is what
kind of drew me in.
Once it crashes down on
earth, like, if it's still
hot-- I was like, I'm
gonna Google about it,
I'm gonna find out about it, and
I'm gonna get myself out there.
-When they come
through the atmosphere,
the very outer layer
melts from that friction,
but the inside is unaffected.
And the heat diffuses so
fast that when they land
on the ground-- [KNOCKING]--
they actually cool.
When people see the meteorite
falling, they go pick it up,
and it hasn't burned them,
or anything like that.
Without actual understanding
of what they can tell us about
the solar system-- without
knowing where they come from,
how we collect them-- then
they really cannot ever hope
to-- to master a-- a-- a
business in this field.
And they recognize
that very quickly.
And the force of
buoyancy was what?
-One.
-One.
So what's its weight
gonna be in water?
-1.5.
-1.5 grams.
Exactly.
2.5 minus the force of buoyancy.
JENNA SOOKNANAN: When I heard
of the virtual enterprise
as a component with
the earth science
I was actually really
excited, because we'd
be seeing how business and
science are intertwined.
KIEREN HOWARD: But the
point is, there's definitely
more demand for meteorites
than there are samples.
So can you come up with
some form of enterprise
to make these samples, perhaps,
mean more to everybody, OK?
That's really what I
think your challenge is.
-It's not real, but we
have to model the business,
and create the business, and
try and execute the business
as if it were real.
-We're all consumers.
Um, and I'd really
like-- if it was me,
I'd like to have a product made
of meteorites, um, something
that would be my own.
-We could do, like,
a complete retreat.
They learn about
meteorites, they
take trips out to whatever
destination it is.
Is it, um, Antarctica?
Is it, um, Australia?
And they'll go exploring
and finding meteorites,
and then they'll
bring them back.
[INAUDIBLE]
-I would definitely love,
like, a sci-fi themed, like,
sculpture.
Or, like, um, you know how
there's, like, action figures
people collect?
-We can go through,
like, blogs or websites
and see how people react
and what kind of interest
that they have in it.
-To, like, just get a feel
for what the market is like
and what the interests
are about, um,
and that could be,
like, on our blog.
And we can advertise there too.
We've gone through quite a
few ideas that, you know,
didn't make it past
the drawing board.
And we've had a few
disagreements on some ideas.
-With the meteorites
that they find,
it can either go to, like,
donations or laboratory use.
That'll show the company
in a better light.
I think it's just that
we have so many ideas,
and there's so many
things that we can do.
There's so many possibilities.
-Like, people would pay
money to see meteorites.
So we could, like,
curate a museum.
DAVID DIAZ: Their
original thoughts were,
let's do a museum.
Let's sell, um, kits to schools.
Let's deal with the researcher.
That's not the way
we're gonna make money.
If the business actually
wants to take off,
we have to get the consumer
and the product together
from the beginning all
the way to the end.
Say they capture it on
film falling down to earth.
They could-- they have
your shooting star
that you made a wish on.
We make that into
a wedding band.
It's something
special for your girl
because it has a
story attached to it,
and then they have the
rare stone on top of it.
It just becomes
rarity on rarity,
which makes it just that
much more expensive.
-That's such a romantic idea.
I really like it.
That is really actually
at the current, sort of,
cutting edge of meteorite
recovery science.
We're seeing more and
more meteorites land,
and recovering more and more
samples that we have observed,
but this is really
a very modern thing.
So to base your whole
business on that,
there's not enough
samples I wouldn't think.
But making rings from
existing meteorites,
that's very possible.
-I would pay as much as it
took to get that customized
or personalized for me, or
for someone special to me.
KIEREN HOWARD: Well, they
really interact very well.
David, yeah, he
fuels the big ideas.
Sort of, the big--
we'll get a movie star
to do this-- the big links.
Jenna, really, she's who I would
want to run my small business.
She sees the practical stuff,
what's going to have to happen.
And Hector is
really, really good
at speaking beautifully
and enthusiastically.
So they have all
the things that they
need for the successful
parts of the project.
-Yeah, I'm trying
to think what we
could make from this
material, and, like,
why people would buy it.
We could mold this, or, like,
sculpt it into, like, you know,
the Starship Enterprise
or something.
Then we could, like,
take commissions.
So, like, that could
be our business.
-Better just stop
you there, Hector.
You feel this object?
-You can't even
carve the meteorite
to make that kind of figurine.
Dr. Howard informed us.
-To craft it into any
kind of meaningful shape
is prohibitively
time ex-- consuming
and-- and likely
very, very expensive.
-I wanted it to be a more
products-driven business.
However, the gathering
of meteorites
is a selling point, which
didn't occur to me at first.
-We could do something like,
uh, the Big Bang Theory.
I like to take
something from nothing
and create something
big out of it.
An actor or something
to say it on a show.
Like, the whole theme
of our-- our company.
-Someone like the Bill
Nye the Science Guy,
because everyone knows
Bill Nye the Science Guy,
we all grew up with that.
DAVID DIAZ: Exactly.
-So--
HECTOR COLON: I think that it
was a little bit too fluffed.
Instead waxing
poetic, it should be,
OK, we're gonna do
A, B and C, and we're
going to accomplish that
by doing X, Y, and Z. Yeah,
what types of, like,
branches are we
going to be involved with?
Like, definitely the
corporate branch.
-We were talking about the
individual, private donation--
DAVID DIAZ: Researchers.
JENNA SOOKNANAN: Researchers.
And that'll give
us our credibility
too because we're
just not some company
going out there
trying to make money.
It'll be backed by science.
-And maybe we have, like,
the educational side,
or-- which will also lend
credibility, I think.
-I think that's a good idea too.
Have kids go on this expedition,
um, and then find meteorites.
And they can-- it can be
an exchange for credit.
DAVID DIAZ: Or we could
do it on a younger level,
and do, like, a summer camp.
So they could start learning
about space at a younger age.
-Private school
summer camp, so maybe
we can keep some of the
profitability in it.
-City kids don't have the funds.
I don't want to
leave anyone out.
People that want to get
in touch with science,
and connect with the
world, and know more
about our surroundings.
-So where are we
getting the funds from?
We should also think
of that as well.
-As much as I want to
do the education point,
I think that it'll be harder
to get funds through there.
And especially grants
that can take-- it
can be really time consuming.
I, kind of, wanted to go
the educational route.
David was very much the--
on the corporate area.
Hector wanted to
do the individual,
and we need to, kind of,
focus in on one, even
though all of them are great.
Um, by focusing on,
you know, on that one
we can still reach the others.
We just still need to
get the funds first,
that's how it turned out to be.
It would have to be through
corporate and the individual.
So private donations, or
people that have the money
and just want to give it, and
then the companies that want
to go on the expeditions.
HECTOR COLON: In order to
make a successful business,
we have to think about
the corporate side,
the individual side.
We have to think about how we're
gonna market it, advertise.
Where we're gonna get the money.
So, yeah, we have to think about
a lot of different factors.
-That sounds like a really
interesting idea-- facilitating
actual collecting trips
to find meteorites
that-- that people are
gonna pay for themselves,
or have funded by corporations,
either because they get some
of the sample, the
product, or contribute
to the generation
of new knowledge
about how the planet formed.
I didn't offer any
direct instructions
as to what the nature of
the business would be.
So while they
would brainstorm, I
would, sort of, try
to sit at the back
and just try to
facilitate things.
Have a look at what kind of
corporations you might think
would be involved in this,
and what kind of people
from those corporations.
And if you want to make it a--
broader in terms of the public,
try and consider maybe what kind
of-- what members of the public
would be interested in this.
Who would it appeal to?
Just try and formalize some
of these brainstorming ideas.
Sounds good.
-If this is where we
are in the beginning,
I can't possibly imagine
where we'll end up.
-How about we just
come back to that.
-OK.
So we were going with the, um--
