FLORENCE, MS (Mississippi News Now) -
Students at Florence High School in Rankin County want to make sure everyone has at least one morning cup of coffee. That may not sound like the typical role of a student!
Drè Helms, Business Fundamentals instructor, believes practical lessons are the best school lessons, so the students are running a real coffee shop inside their school.
Mocha Locha is run out of the basketball concession stand area. The students are dressed in Mocha Locha tee shirts as they take orders, and serve coffee and other food and drink items from behind the counter. Coffee is $1 and specialty drinks are $2. The students order the coffee and food from a vendor.
Mocha Locha is opens at 7:15am and closes at 7:50am to give everyone a time to get to class. The coffee shop has been open for two weeks, and so far it has been a success.
"It's just way busier than what we thought it was gonna be. I didn't think when we first opened we were gonna have a lot of people, but when we did, business started rolling," says 9th grader Koalbee Brown.
"They came up with the name, the ideas, the menu, all of the marketing. It's just exceeded our expectations," says Helms. "This is as close to a real-world experience as we can give a 9th grade Freshman in high school, so they are excited about it."
The students will be graded on their participation. They're learning how to take inventory, how to work as a team, and how to spend money wisely.
This week, the balance sheet for Mocha Locha came out even. Once it starts making a profit, the cash will probably go back into the classroom.
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