Three Edwards School of Business students listen nervously to the speakerphone as they learn the results of their promotional campaign in the Canadian wide competition challenge, NESTEA® The Recruit^TM.

They call their team The Closers, but we know them as Jesse Maerz, 20; Kevin Ostafie, 20; and Mike Vossen, 21.  The three students cheer enthusiastically when they find out that they have won the Challenge against 24 teams from 8 universities across Canada. 

Modeled after the hit television show, “The Apprentice”, NESTEA® The Recruit^TM develops three “Challenges” that run the duration of the school year.  University students are encouraged to use business smarts and marketing savvy to compete against other teams for the title of The Recruits^TM.

Each challenge teaches students relevant marketing skills across numerous disciplines including but not limited to Social Media, Public Relations, Promotional Marketing and Experiential Marketing.  The challenge for The Closers consisted of two distinct assignments. The first, to effectively utilize social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter to garner user generated content. The second, to raise funds for Children’s Miracle Network through a 24 hour text-a-thon campaign and/or through Facebook ‘likes’.

Collectively, the 24 teams came up with very unique ways to solve the Challenge. NESTEA® is pleased to announce Challenge # 1 raised over $12,500 for Children’s Miracle Network; $10,000 from text or online donations from over 1,600 unique phone numbers from across Canada and $5,000 from the 15,000 Facebook fans who liked the 24 individual teams’ page.

Beating out all 23 teams, the Edwards students, a management major and two finance majors, will each receive a one year paid tuition (up to $7,500) and an internship in Toronto at Coca-Cola, Pizza Pizza, or Inventa Marketing.  Congratulations guys, and great job representing the Edwards School of Business and the University of Saskatchewan. 

For more information about the NESTEA® The Recruit^TM, please go to:  www.nestearecruit.com.

View their reaction to the news of their win below!