Like entrepreneurial Davids facing down fiscal Goliaths, students from Ian MacKay's economics class at Arlington High School offer a heartwarming tale of fear turned to victory. At the first New England International Economic Summit, seniors Vojtech Klinger, Sara Ahmed, Jennifer Lawrence and Sean Boyle took the coveted top spot of grand champions.

The unanimous reaction to the win was shock.

"By the time [the announcer] was calling the grand champion, I had given up," said Ahmed, whose group represented Indonesia throughout the conference. "I sat for two seconds, and it didn't register in my brain. Then I was like, "Wait, that's us!"

The costumes were daunting

Klinger agreed, saying that he was "surprised and satisfied" by the unforeseen win in December.  

On behalf of the AHS students, surprise may be justified. After an hourlong bus ride to Bridgewater State College, the school hosting the summit, many students were discouraged by the initial appearance of their opponents. "Everyone looked so prepared!" exclaimed Randeep Saini, a junior who was on team Egypt.

The daunting factor was the costumes: "People had on face paint, flags, traditional garb," Saini said. "It was like stepping into some strange parallel world where residents from all countries were forced to peacefully sit in one room."

Noted Alex Trepler, a junior on the Russian team: "It looks like these kids shelled out hundreds of dollars for all their props."

Including MacKay's class of 16 students, representing Russia, France, Egypt, and Indonesia, 67 teams from 10 schools participated in the summit. Buses transported economics students from as far off as Connecticut and Vermont in order for them to compete. 

All teams had been preparing for the conference for the past few months in their economics classrooms. Even with such a level of foresight, the AHS students felt shaky on entering the summit. "I would have liked to do more preparation," MacKay said. "But we had to skip three chapters of the regular curriculum to prepare for this."

Glimpses of the global economy

The summit's goal is to simulate the inner workings of global economy while highlighting the competitive edge needed to survive in real-world economics.

Organized by the Federal Reserve of Boston, Bridgewater State College and the Challenger Foundation, the conference cost more than $20,000 to put together. Margret Brooks, a professor of economics at Bridgewater and the president of the Mass. Council on Economic Education, said the cost of the summit is largely due to preparation.

“We had to pay for transport, as well as the teaching materials needed in order to get students ready,” Brooks said.

Each group of four to six students was assigned to a team, which was then allotted a specific country. Before the summit, teams researched their countries, finding out such information as the gross domestic product and the amount of Internet users as a percent of the population. Each team also wrote an economics proposal, aiming to stimulate the global economy while combating such issues as poverty and hunger.

The summit was point-based. Each team received a specified number of points for each part of the conference it completed or participated in. Scheduled to run from 8:30 to 3, the conference started about 40 minutes late. After a quick briefing on the day’s agenda, the conference began with a 10-question geography quiz.

AHS's teams of Egypt and Russia were among the 10 teams who had received perfect scores.

Following the quiz, students were asked to mingle and gather signatures from other "countries" signifying support of their economic proposals. The six teams with the most signatures at the conclusion of the 30-minute session were invited to share their proposals in a debate format, where the audience was allowed to ask questions or challenge their proposals. An AHS team did not manage to make it into the debate. 

After the debate, students formed "alliances" with other countries. Each team could belong in as many as two alliances of six countries a piece. An alliance would allow free trade between the teams in the following portion of the summit. "The whole process is an interesting mix of companionship and competition," Trepler said.

After a quick lunch, teams returned to the summit hall for the final portion of the conference. First, another test was in order. A 12-question assessment examined students about their knowledge of general economics concepts. Then the trading session began.

A stressful push in the last hour

The pinnacle of the summit was the last hour, where students frantically rushed back and forth between countries trading goods and services in exchange for ones specified for their countries. Each team was given a distinct supply of various goods, such as food, energy and transportation, represented by colorful flash cards. Each team had an allotted number of imports it needed to get a full score. "I was running, screaming, wearing a weird costume," Klinger said, referring to his approach to the most stressful part of the conference. 

The award ceremony concluded brought the summit to a close. Categories included best costume, best table display, low-, middle- and high-country category winners, and the ultimate title of grand champion.

As each award was announced and given to non-AHS teams, spirits dropped. "I was getting discouraged," Ahmed said.

Yet when the master of ceremonies announced the winning team, with a massive amount of 167 points, as Indonesia, there was a momentary silence. "I was shocked and so happy to see kids from my class had won!" says Saini, who, like many others, soon responded to the pronouncement with an echoing cheer. 

"I'm ecstatic that one of the teams from Arlington can represent the school so well," MacKay said. "I'd like to do this program in future years so other students can experience learning about economics in a very hands-on fashion." 

"We deserve it," Klinger said, summing up the feelings of AHS's victorious economics class.

The writer, a junior, is a member of the AHS honors journalism class.