By means of a partnership with the town of Columbus Division of Neighborhoods, The Ohio State College hosted the second annual My Brother’s Keeper Enterprise Camp on the Columbus campus June 26-30. The residential camp, known as Taking Care of Enterprise, introduced 40 highschool college students to campus to study enterprise and expertise faculty life.
“They get launched to each primary space in enterprise via our professors,” stated Cynthia Turner, assistant dean for range and inclusion on the Fisher School of Enterprise and organizer of the camp. “We’ve professors who are available in and train courses in finance, accounting and advertising.”
This yr’s camp centered on the enterprise of sports activities. Along with Fisher college, visitor audio system included enterprise professionals from across the nation who help athletes and sports activities groups with monetary planning, accounting and branding. The scholars additionally took a discipline journey to Decrease.com Area, the Columbus Crew’s downtown soccer stadium, and spoke to workplace personnel who handle the crew’s advertising and social media.
“The purpose is to introduce them to careers in enterprise via the lens of sports activities,” Turner stated. “We perceive that with each athlete, with each entertainer, they’ve a crew of oldsters (behind the scenes) that do effectively and make good cash and that’s their occupation.”
Enterprise professionals not solely shared their experience with the scholars, but in addition provided insights about their profession paths.
“With each speaker, we even have them share their story of how they acquired there so the scholars perceive that it’s arduous work typically and never every little thing is simply given to you,” stated Tai Johnson, a Fisher range, fairness and inclusion educational outreach specialist who additionally administers the camp. “Life does take a number of twists and turns. We’ve other ways of going about reaching your objectives aside from the way in which you thought it was going to be.”
College students additionally discovered about private finance and cash administration via classes with licensed public accountants and banking professionals. The target is to equip college students with on a regular basis life expertise whereas elevating their consciousness of enterprise rules, stated Kyle Strickland, a compliance specialist with Ohio State’s Kirwan Institute for the Research of Race and Ethnicity and director of My Brother’s Keeper Ohio.
“We’re right here to say, ‘How will we assist you to attain your goals? How will we assist you to acquire these potentialities?’” Strickland stated. “We’ve to do our half to make sure that everyone has entry to sources and everyone can obtain their goals, it doesn’t matter what the boundaries are, as a result of we have now folks that come collectively.”
Throughout their week on campus, college students labored in groups to develop hypothetical advertising plans to broaden the My Brother’s Keeper Enterprise Camp to a year-round program with the monetary assist of Ohio sports activities groups. On the camp’s closing day, the scholars pitched their advertising plans to a panel of enterprise professionals and My Brother’s Keeper and metropolis of Columbus directors.
“We need to be sure that younger folks such as you guys have all of the alternatives which can be afforded to you,” Carla Williams-Scott, director of the Division of Neighborhoods, stated to the scholars earlier than they started their pitches. “Lots of younger folks don’t get this chance till they end faculty and so they’re beginning of their careers, to have the ability to community and work together with a few of the people that you simply guys have had the chance to speak to this week.”
Of their pitch displays, college students described the advantages of the My Brother’s Keeper Enterprise Camp.
“One of many extra vital features is that we’re going to be creating a brand new workforce,” stated Anthony Estrada, who might be a junior at Westland Excessive Faculty within the fall. “Though we’re all simply youngsters now, in 20 to 30 years, we’re going to be working these positions of energy in finance and totally different companies. It is rather vital that we put together the longer term generations to have these expertise.”
Keziah Jackson, who might be a senior at Centennial Excessive Faculty and can be a cosmetology pupil at Columbus Downtown Excessive Faculty, stated she discovered entrepreneurial expertise that may assist her understand long-term objectives.
“That is my second yr right here, and after I was right here my first yr, it was a extremely superb program for me – all of the connections I made, the folks I met,” she stated. “It was actually life-changing.”