We've noticed you there, sitting in your dorm rooms,
sipping brews in the campus pub, strolling across campus with
copies of Start Your Own Business (Entrepreneur Media
Inc.) . . . with nary a thought of getting a
corporate job once you graduate from college. And so we feel
compelled to cheer on those of you who are starting your own
businesses while you're still hitting the books. Welcome to
BizU.
Instead of just learning about starting their own businesses,
students at Flagler College in Saint Augustine, Florida, are
actually doing it. With the help of the nonprofit organization
Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE), a core team of 20 students
launched two businesses in the summer of 1999: The Ponce Shop and
Legacy Tours, businesses that promote regional history by offering
tours and selling merchandise. This year, the group started two
more businesses: Flagler's Legacy, a shop in downtown St.
Augustine, and Flagler's Legacy Online, its virtual
companion.
But what's even more interesting about the Flagler crew is
the fact that they're doing this simply because they want to.
The students don't receive college credit for their efforts,
and though making a profit is certainly one of their objectives,
the team is more concerned with teaching entrepreneurship to the
Saint Augustine community-even while they're learning the ropes
themselves. One of their more successful programs, Follow the
Leader, allows at-risk teenagers from a local alternative high
school to shadow SIFE members, learning business skills in the
process. "You can really see a change in the girls we've
worked with," says Sarah Baskin, 22, president of
Flagler's SIFE program. "Now they have plans for the
future."
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This year, Flagler's team will include eight to 10 more high
school students working on-campus in departments ranging from the
radio station to alumni relations. "The teenagers are getting
exposure to college," says Donna Webb, a SIFE faculty advisor
at Flagler (named Sam M. Walton Free Enterprise Fellows).
"They meet with us and talk about their experiences."
Indeed, exposing young people to entrepreneurship is SIFE's
main objective. "We provide college students with the
opportunity to make a difference," says Alvin Rohrs, CEO and
President of SIFE. "They learn leadership, teamwork and
communications skills while practicing the principles of free
enterprise."
Flagler's team, which was named Southeast regional champions
last year by the SIFE organization, also worked with local
businesspeople to bring Junior Achievement (JA) to their county
this year. SIFE members were able to test a pilot program at a
local middle school, leading such JA classes as Job Opportunities
and Interviews, Using Credit Wisely and Personal Budgeting. The
team has also been active on its own campus, instituting
"Responsible Use of Credit Week" to educate Flagler
students about using credit cards wisely.
The team's ultimate goal with these projects is to make a
lasting impression. "We create our own futures," says
Webb. "That's our motto. We try to look at the big picture
and take ideas that will have long-term impact." At the end of
each year, the students evaluate the previous year's projects
and discuss how to improve them. Over the summer, each student
collects information for new projects and then presents it at the
beginning of the new school year. The team members then brainstorm
their ideas and vote on seven that seem plausible. "We try to
teach the students to take an idea into action," says Webb.
"Too often, we live in the shadow of an idea that's never
implemented. Our goal is to make the idea become a
reality."
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