The Bay Area is known as a thriving startup community. But Suzanne McKechnie Klahr was struck by the inequality she saw there while working as a pro-bono lawyer in East Palo Alto. She wanted to make it easier for those with disadvantaged backgrounds to both get a good education and to find support for their small businesses. So in 1999 she founded BUILD, a nonprofit which gives entrepreneurial support and funding to disconnected high-schoolers with small business ideas.
BUILD now serves more than 930 students in three cities across the country, providing small business classes and start-up funding to the kids most likely to drop out of high school. “We are looking for students who were truant and had low test scores in middle school,” McKechnie Klahr says. “We want to engage them as soon as they get into 9th grade because disengagement in 9th grade is highly predictive of dropping out of high school.” Such intervention has already been successful. According to the folks at BUILD, 99 percent of seniors in the program have graduated from high school and 95 percent have been accepted to college.
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Tag: entrepreneurship
SXSW: 10 Panels That Could Change America
What can bring innovators, entrepreneurs, journalists, activists, geeks, and hipsters all together? That would be South by Southwest Interactive (SXSW), which kicks off today in Austin, Texas.
This rather eclectic crowd gathers for panels, presentations, and even parties on all that is new and next. Not only are there a wide range of attendees, but panel discussions as well: They cover everything from “The Internet of Cars” to “Hacking Princess Culture” to “Being Social With Grandma: Social Media for 50+.”
For those of us with our eyes on the most creative solutions to our national challenges, here are the sessions we think have the most potential to impact America. Certainly, their messages will extend far beyond the podium and long past the Q&A:
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Heading to SXSW? Hopefully, we’ll see you at the one of these panels. But if you’re not able to make it, use the hashtags listed on the session URLs to join the virtual conversation, then let us know how you plan to take action!
This Solar Farm Stands for a Lot More Than Clean Energy
Farming is a tradition in Reginald Parker’s family. His mother and her family grew up picking cotton as sharecroppers, and his dad picked tobacco. But Parker is continuing that legacy in a new vein — farming solar energy. He plans to open a six-acre, 1.4 megawatt solar farm in North Carolina on Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a form of remembrance for his family, but also as a triumph for African American entrepreneurship in the South. “This land was originally used for cotton farming, so with our groundbreaking we are announcing the change from cotton farming to solar farming in North Carolina, and cotton farming is something I truly will not miss,” Parker told Grist. “It was something like servitude to be a sharecropper, but now we’re owners, and that’s a source of pride in my family.”
An MIT graduate, Parker learned about solar energy after he wrote a paper for the African Technology Forum where he proposed the use of solar energy in Zimbabwe. “People beat up on solar because of the initial start-up costs to install solar energy, but it’s still significantly less than the costs for coal,” Parker told Grist. “Coal is trying to stay in there, but coal and natural gas have two things working against them: Both are in limited supply.” Here’s to many years of bountiful sunshine in North Carolina.
MORE: This Bizarre Bacteria Could Clean Up the Oil Business
Better Health Through…Texting?
As a diabetic himself, Vineet Singal knows first-hand that being on top of his condition is the key to staying healthy. That’s what inspired him to create his business Anjna Patient Education when he was a senior at Stanford. The company helps people stay in closer contact with their health providers with a simple, text-messaging app that sends appointment and medication reminders and tips on eating better. It’s already been picked up by a few California hospitals. They pay Anina for the app, and then provide it free to their low-income clients. Singal’s app even snagged him a $40,000 Hitachi Foundation Yoshiyama Young Entrepreneurs Program award this year.
The New Kind of Corporate Structure—Baking Social Good Right Into the Business Plan
Do you know B Corps? It’s a new kind of corporate structure, that lets U.S. businesses incorporate as a “public benefit corporation.” The idea for a B Corp is that doing good things for society and caring for the environment are part of the company’s DNA, along with being a profitable business. Currently, B Corp status is available in 16 states and D.C. And it’s not just for bigger companies, like green-cleaning giant Method or outdoor gear company Patagonia. (Who by the way have discovered that being a B Corp helps attract Millennial talent.) Even tiny micro-companies can do it and make a big impact. Get inspired by this 2013 list of top B Corps. Think of all the different ways your B Corp could help your customers and the communities where you work and live.