String lights decorated the second floor of Porto Bello, creating a romantic feel to the event. Along the walls, boards were lined up with their creators beaming beside them. Attendees walked from table to table in admiration of the student-created longboards, surfboards, and paddleboards.

iCreate360 teachers Chad Jettner and Jeremy Case stood at the front, admiring it all.

“I think they deserve a round of applause,” Jettner said to the audience. “They’ve worked really, really hard. I am so pumped and excited. The products tonight are amazing.”

Forty students in the entrepreneurship class, iCreate360, had been working on their projects for the duration of the school year, learning and experiencing different aspects of the business world.

To showcase their work, a live auction was held on Monday May 15 from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in the banquet room at Porto Bello. Over thirty products were auctioned off in three different waves. The money raised from the event will go towards supplies for next year’s class.

“Talking to these students, the work they’ve done, and the culmination of that tonight, really is for next year’s students because the funds tonight help buy all of our materials for next year,” Jettner said. “I think that’s awesome.”

On the far right of the banquet room seniors Sarah Dufon and Sloan Shanahan stood giggling next to their surfboard. Along with their other group member, have spent around three hours a day for the past month, working on boards for the iCreate360 class working up to the auction.

“I think it’s awesome that we get to see everything that we’ve worked on throughout the whole year, we get to see it all around Grand Haven,” Dufon said. “I think that’s pretty awesome. I would like to take it home for myself but I can’t take it home for myself so I mean the fact that’s it’s going to be in Grand Haven is pretty awesome.”

Their group had finished ahead of the others, so they decided to use their time to help finish other boards in order to get everything done in time for the event.

“After a lot of time and effort we’ve put into it, it kind of becomes a passion,” Shanahan said.

A piece that caught many bidders eyes was a long board designed by seniors Deacon Poole and Bryan Batten. The bottom displayed the word “pow” within a brightly colored bubble in comic book font.

“The design was my idea,” Poole said. “When I saw the unique shape I kind of imagined something that would really stand out when you showed the bottom of it and so I thought, ‘Why not one of those comic book movie titles where it says ‘pow’ right when Batman punches The Joker in the face?’”

The class partnered with art teacher Irene Sipe’s students to paint the bottom of their longboards. Poole and Batten asked junior Xavier Golden to paint theirs for them.

“He did the artwork and it came out looking better than I could’ve imagined,” Poole said.

The pair spent most of their time on the paddle board, so when the last few weeks of the class rolled around, they had to spend many days after school in order to finish in time.

“It’s very encouraging that the amount work that two high school students can put into making something to have hundreds of adults come look at it and bid on it,” Poole said. “It’s really positive and encouraging to see that people are interested.”

iCreate360’s slogan for the year was, “Paddle it Forward”, playing off the name of the Pay it Forward class. This kept up the mentality of raising money for next year’s students.

“This is affecting the students next year, so when people come and bid on it, it feels supportive to not only me, but the program itself,” Batten said. “They’re affecting the next class that comes up.”

Maddie Monroe