David Schafer

My Story

Being a little over halfway through my sophomore year at Glenbrook south has taught me a lot about becoming the person you want to be. I play lacrosse at the JV level and my coaches motivate me to push myself to not only get better at the sport, but also to improve myself to be athletic, healthy, and have the life I want to have. Ever since I learned that my older brother was starting a business, I have wanted to help him grow it. Being fifteen at the time and having a little bit of experience in graphic design and web design, I offered to build him a website in exchange for being able to do some of the smaller jobs the business got such as weeding and moving. Although I had only worked at our Dad’s restaurant when they needed help, I was eager to work and help Erik with any jobs he needed. I learned a lot about the back end management of the website and helped create systems for messaging our employees about what jobs were happening to distribute them among our managers and workers. Now, over a year later, I am in my sophomore year at Glenbrook South High School and I am interested in the fields of business, engineering and computer science. My interest in business has sparked in the last two years with both my Dad being a restaurant/brewery owner and my brother creating his own business to help our community in Glenview with jobs around their homes. Moreover, my interest for engineering started from a young age. This led me into the world of creating things from the ground up. I asked my family members for legos for christmas which later turned into asking for robotics kits. When I was around nine years old, one of my friends asked if I wanted to take a game development summer camp. Ever since then I dreamed of making my own video games. My love for building has given me immense interest for many of the things I want to accomplish later in life. I have always loved the feeling of creating something and realizing that it started out as just parts I had to put together, or in the case of video game development, an empty world and my imagination. I am now starting to see myself feel the exact same way about Student Maintenance. Three years ago, this business was just an idea for all of us. After years of hard work, we have managed to create a fully fledged business that we can feel pride in creating. Although we have come a long way in creating this company, we have big ambitions for 2025 and the years following. My dream is to not only create a company with my older brother that we can be proud of, but also create a community of happy customers with the homes of their dreams. Although I am the youngest of all of our team members here at Student Maintenance, I strive to work my hardest to learn how the company runs from the inside. It has been difficult for me since I do not have as much experience as Erik or Daniel, however, after getting my drivers license back in october, I have been able to come to more jobs, do quotes for our clients, and with the help of Daniel, Erik, Vlad and Jack, I quickly picked up how to help operate Student Maintenance efficiently. My favorite part of Student Maintenance is that I can create something that I am proud of and work with my brother in the process. I am extremely excited for the future months this year since I will be able to see the business hopefully reach our expectations, and I will be able to feel a sense of accomplishment with my brother and my friends.