Overview

The ERC connects our youth to our local entrepreneurial community and business ecosystem fostering the growth of a skilled workforce and job creators who are competent, creative, and innovative. Currently, the ERC offers a series of four programs with plans to expand curriculum offerings in the future.

This is an introductory twelve-week course dedicated to exploring the fundamentals of entrepreneurship and fostering an entrepreneurial mindset. The course prepares students to cultivate a mindset for thinking and acting that can empower them to succeed, no matter their chosen career path. Students learn how to use an entrepreneurial mindset to create value for others by seeing problems as opportunities and using their knowledge and talents to solve those problems. Drawing from the eight core concepts of the Entrepreneurial Learning Initiative's (ELI), Who Owns the Icehouse? along with the ERC curriculum, the course enables students to learn directly from the firsthand experience of real-world entrepreneurs who share their knowledge and experience throughout the course.

 

Students also take the Entrepreneurial Mindset Profile® (EMP) at Eckerd College to learn more about their natural entrepreneurial skills and capabilities. The EMP serves as a powerful self-awareness tool that helps our students recognize and leverage their entrepreneurial traits for success in entrepreneurship, other career paths, and their lives in general.

Entrepreneurial Essentials and Endeavors (EEE) is a 12-week intermediate-level course that centers on the fundamental principles of entrepreneurial thinking and endeavors. Students are guided through the process of taking a business idea from inception to validation, developing a comprehensive understanding of how to analyze market opportunities, assessing the feasibility of their concepts, creating effective business models, and pitching their ideas. The course fosters critical thinking, problem-solving, and teamwork, as students work together to refine their ideas and prepare for their culminating presentation at our exciting Pitch Night.

 

Upon successful completion of the EEE program, students will be invited to advance their entrepreneurial journey in Advanced: Entrepreneurial Topics. A prominent feature of this program is the integration of the Wharton Interactive Entrepreneurial Simulation game, an innovative learning tool that enables students to immerse themselves in realistic entrepreneurial scenarios. By making decisions, navigating challenges, and experiencing the consequences of their choices, students will deepen their understanding of business dynamics. Students will also have the opportunity to hone in on their newly developed personal entrepreneurial expertise to showcase their business products and services of their businesses at one of our exciting Youth Vendor Fair events.