[dropcap size=”2″]I[/dropcap]n the midst of the Christmas season, the Columbia Area Career Center (CACC) will host their Holiday Sale Dec. 12-13. CACC classes of Advanced Horticulture, Greenhouse Production and Plant and Floral Design will join forces to sell neatly designed floral arrangements.
The sale includes poinsettias, wreaths, candle centerpieces and students’ designs. CACC horticulture teacher Sherie Rodekohr said all proceeds will go to their extracurricular fund and will provide students with materials for the class. With 66 fresh arrangements and 66 artificial centerpieces, the designers hope to sell all of the handcrafted goods by the end of the sale.
“Students in greenhouse production have grown poinsettias and then the floral design students are making artificial and fresh plant designs,” Rodekohr said. “It allows us to offer those products that the students have either grown or designed to the public.”
The students advertise the sale and set it up as if it were a real retail business. Rodekohr said the students will transform their horticulture building into  a store that displays all of the arrangements the students made. Each designer will price their items and take initiative with the sales transactions, including using cash registers and an iPad to model professional businesses.
“It’s like a real retail store,” Rodekohr said. “I think [most] of them work retail, but some of the younger students that can’t get retail jobs get experience in retail through waiting on customers and at least learn how to operate a cash register.”
The students may be pulling off the bulk of the work, but for senior Maggie Victor,  the pieces they display is a reflection of what their teachers taught them over the semester.“[I like how we can] show [the consumers] what all Rodekohr has taught us,” Victor said. “We’ll be using what she taught us about the principles and elements of design and how to make an arrangement look balanced and good. It’s also exciting to see who likes our pieces and what they like about them.”
While most students participating in the sale are participating in their first-year Floral and Plant Design, there are a couple of veterans joining as well. Senior Ellen Dill-Hirsch chose Advanced Horticulture, the highest course offered for horticulture out of 85 other CACC classes offered.
“I really liked Floral and Plant Design, and I had extra spots on my schedule for my senior year,” Dill-Hirsch said. “We get to do basically everything that floral does, so I’m going to make an artificial piece, a fresh centerpiece and a fresh wreath.”
The Horticulture building has five sales a year: Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter and Mother’s Day, with Valentine’s Day being the next.
“Next semester we will start preparing for Valentine’s Day,” Rodekohr said. “We mix it up between lab work and classroom work. The students will learn how to make rose designs and all kinds of different things that are sold at Valentine’s Day.”
Will you be buying arrangements from the Holiday Sale?