NFTE blog

By: Keon Massey, 12th Grade NFTE Student

I didn’t know anything about the fundamentals of business when I was first introduced to the entrepreneurship class at my school, but I knew that I loved marketing. In September, my NFTE class went on a field trip to the Philadelphia Convention Center to meet and work with professionals from Ernst & Young. At the EY Connect Day,  I was introduced to Mrs. Sylvia McKinney, the executive director of NFTE Philadelphia, and the business world. We all had an assignment to develop a better business plan from a business assigned to us at random. The group that I led performed perfectly, and we won the competition that day.

That was just for starters

Today at 9:00 AM ET (Tuesday, November 27th) the Microsoft Giving Tuesday begins! This is your last chance to Double Your Impact and your gift to NFTE through the generosity of the people at Microsoft. Matches will be made up to $1,000 per donor, per project on the Give For Youth website, and funding is limited. 

Intro by: Sylvia McKinney, NFTE Philadelphia Executive Director

NFTE Philadelphia is busy getting back into the routine of school, but last year’s regional challenge winners are also busy. They’re prepping for next month’s NFTE National Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge. Both young entrepreneurs who will represent the Philadelphia program office, Raleigh Russell and Dominique Hughes, share their paths to success.

NFTE's program offices anticipate helping more than 18,000 students discover entrepreneurship this school year. That's nearly 2,000 additional students compared to last school year.

The South Florida program office, in 2011-2012, reached the most students overall, while the NY Metro program office brought NFTE to the most schools. The chart below shows the number of schools where NFTE is at work and the number of students who completed the program.

School bells are ringing, and NFTE is ready to help more young people develop an entrepreneurial mindset. This school year, two new members of NFTE’s New York Metro program office, Kate Materese and Carlos Mendoza, will blog about working with NFTE students and learning the NFTE way. Today, meet Carlos:

Hi, my name is Carlos Mendoza and I am excited to be part of the NFTE family!  Prior to joining NFTE, I was a member of City Year New York from 2008-2012, where I had the opportunity to manage and coach diverse teams of AmeriCorps members in two Queens public middle schools—IS 126 and IS 204—around their work to improve their students’ attendance, behavior, and performance in English and math.

How can a college degree statistically improve your odds of finding a job? Look at this job growth data for people with a high school diploma, some college, or bachelor’s degree via Whitney Tilson.

Congratulations to this year's Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2012 Alumni Fund Scholarship Recipients! Ernst & Young generously supports these young NFTE graduates, and NFTE is sincerely grateful. Some of this year's scholarship recipients have dreams of becoming entrepreneurs, investors and community leaders. Discover the schools they are attending and where they took the NFTE program.

Where are new jobs coming from? NFTE supporter Ernst & Young knows: Entrepreneurs are driving 30% job growth at the more than 600 companies represented by E&Y’s 2012 US Entrepreneur Of The Year® program. That compares to negative overall U.S. job growth. Revenue growth is even greater at 48% compared to an American average of 5.6%.

Navarrow Wright is the CTO of Interactive One, the largest digital media company serving Black Americans. He recently spoke during the NFTE Philadelphia Regional Finals. Listen to how he describes the issue of technology exposure within the young black community and how NFTE can help grow young entrepreneurs.

Learn more about Wright’s entrepreneur background and connect with him on Twitter or LinkedIn.