IQALUIT
An Iqaluit teen used her experience living in the North to win a boot camp event organized by the Jr. Economic Club of Canada.

Katie Devereaux of Inukshuk High School was part of the winning team which won the organization's Bay Street Boot Camp. The five-day financial literacy course and business challenge culminated in a pitch competition to business leaders and experts.

Iqaluit teen Katie Devereaux of Inukshuk High School, second from left, stands with Jan Dymond of the Investment Funds Institute of Canada, first left, fellow first-place winner Caitlin Chua, Brooke Biscoe of Fundata and Sahhara Leckie who is also on the team. Their business idea to refurbish sea cans into affordable housing won them $10,000 in scholarship funds at the Jr. Economic Club's third annual boot camp. - photo courtesy of the Jr. Economic Club of Canada

Devereaux and her teammates, Caitlin Chua and Sahhara Leckie, both from Toronto, won for their idea to refurbish shipping containers, commonly known as sea cans, into affordable, sustainable, low-cost housing. Calling the idea "Box Homes," the team advanced to the final round of six and ultimately won the three students $10,000 in scholarship funds, provided by Fundata.

Devereaux told News/North the idea came from her experience living in the North, observing the number of sea cans in Iqaluit, especially after the annual sealift deliveries.

"We just have hundreds of them sitting around here," she said. "I think it was on the plane flying over Iqaluit I thought, 'Hey, what can we do with these?'"

Devereaux and the four other students from Iqaluit were part of a pilot project to bring teens from the North to participate in the event.

"The conference was above and beyond my expectations," she said. "It was a lot bigger than I expected."

First Air and Porter Airlines were the two major sponsors that helped bring the five students from Iqaluit to participate in the event.

"First Air is actively contributing to Canada's Northern economy," stated Bert van der Stege, First Air's vice-president of commercial services in a news release. "We will soon need the leaders of tomorrow and are proud to have students from the North participating in this Jr. Economic Club of Canada Boot Camp."

Devereaux said First Air president Brock Friesen also attended the event and that meeting him was one of her networking highlights.

During the event in Toronto, Devereaux and her teammates worked to figure out the demographics of potential clients, price points and building materials.

She said the biggest question from the experts who served as judges was the group's plans for growth in the future.

"We had initially based our idea out of Vancouver and then translate that to the Toronto area, Calgary, Montreal, the big city hubs," she said. "Then we decided 'Why not work with something like Habitat for Humanity or go oversees to crisis zones or disaster areas?'"

Still, Devereaux and her teammates were pushed to think about international markets and how they could be a source of revenue.

"We had said that for more of an economic growth plan we would hit the Chinese market and try to offer sustainable housing to their government directly for subsidized housing programs," she said. "It wasn't something we planned on saying, but we just threw it out there."

Devereaux said the event taught her a lot about thinking quickly, the realities of business and put many things into perspective, especially after talking to many of the executives from companies like TD Bank, Sun Life Financial, the Insurance Bureau of Canada and VISA Canada.

As for the future, Devereaux said the event definitely changed her idea of what she wants to study during her post-secondary education.

"The programs that I'm looking into are international business or international relations with a background in economics," she said, adding that she had officially graduated from high school in June but chose to stay in Iqaluit for an extra semester of classes. "I think the conference really opened up my eyes to that line of work.

"Meeting all these people and all these speakers - I really got a sense of what I can do."

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.