Communities across North Carolina are successfully incorporating youth entrepreneurship into their economic development strategies. Community organizations and educators are partnering to offer youth entrepreneurship camps that build entrepreneurial skills in youth. This article shows examples of how communities are recognizing the need for youth involvement in economic development.
Many youth between the ages of 9 and 18 attend youth entrepreneurship camps across North carolina. A variety of camp activities include hearing from local entrepreneurs, starting hands-on activities to learn about their community, assessing their own skills, and creating a venture idea. During the camp, youth complete activities that build creativity, Arias Agencies teamwork, leadership, and financial literacy skills.
A remarkable trait of many camps is the partnering that takes place across the community to make the camps a reality tv. Several community partnerships include Community Colleges, Public Schools, local 4-H Cooperative Extension, and native Boys and Girls Clubs. Many camps are held on Community College campuses to help expose youth to the teachers environment.
From the very beginning, camp participants are encouraged to “think like an entrepreneur” by be resourceful and taking perils. The business teams are encouraged to colon cleanses what their community needs, what they do well, and what interests them. The teams quickly become competitive about who has the most creative and sometimes most outrageous business solutions. Unfailingly, the adults who serve as judges for the final presentations are in awe of the creativity of the ideas, the excellence of the presentations, and the engagement of students.
Many communities decide to select a layout for their entrepreneurship camp and encourage students to build a business around the theme. One theme camp was delivered by a partnership that included Carteret Community College and the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum. With funding from the Conservation Fund, the College and Museum created an entrepreneurship camp that taught students about the heritage and history of Harker’s Island and also the local community. Campers created businesses that reflected this heritage, including a tool that would help boats stuck on sand bars, rrncluding a nature center that would offer guided excursions. One student commented, “My favorite part was learning what it took to make a business and manage a checkbook.”
Many counties in western North Carolina are offering youth entrepreneurship camps to teach youth leadership and problem solving knowledge. Communities are beginning to understand american income life the worth of partnerships and effort. Wilkes Community College partners with 4-H Cooperative Extension to offer Youth Entrepreneurship Camps in Wilkes and Arias Agencies [http://www.hollister.us.org] Ashe Counties. The camps combine entrepreneurship with growing industries in the region including advanced materials and sustainable liveliness. Students took part in a presentation by Martin Marietta Materials and learned concerning how composite materials are developed and assessed. They were able to handle and test materials such as the blast proof panels that protect U.S. troops. Through the theme camps students were encouraged to ponder developing businesses that capitalize on the assets on their community.
Several counties will work together to offer a regional youth entrepreneurship camp. Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College gives the Young Entrepreneurial Scholars (YES!) Camp for high-school students checked out year started a Middle School Academy Camp for Middle school students. The Young Entrepreneurial Scholars (YES!) Camp requires interested students to submit a camp application and recommendations. Students who participate enter in the camp with their own business idea may hope to are a real enterprise one day.
Many communities across North Carolina are making the decision to incorporate youth entrepreneurship within economic development idea. Youth entrepreneurship camps build on the trend and teach young people how to think like entrepreneurs and make a community that encourages entrepreneurship. Students check out entrepreneurship as a vocation option, and learn entrepreneurial skills that can benefit them whatever their career approach. Youth entrepreneurship plays a role in economic development as community leaders learn tangible ways to become a success part of their larger strategy. Entire regions will benefit through the coming of more businesses nicely better trained work force.