Hamer is part of the team at the Nebraska Department of Economic Development. Hamer said despite all the resources available, many are lured away from starting a business because of the risk involved and the fear of failure.

“Part of [the fear] is the risk,” he said. “Many people are risk adverse. If you’re going to be an entrepreneur you’re going to have to be willing to have failures. That’s part of being an entrepreneur.”

Hamer said the foundation of strong business in Nebraska is entrepreneurs, but defining an entrepreneur is one of the struggles the NDED has faced.

“Entrepreneurships are very important. One of the things we’ve struggled with is how do you define entrepreneur. Many people think if you own a business, you’re an entrepreneur but a business owner is not necessarily an entrepreneur.”

He said many programs out there are focused on helping all kinds of small businesses and not necessarily just entrepreneurs.

“A lot of programs that are set up under the guise of what we do to help entrepreneurs, but they basically help small businesses.”

The NDED has dozens of programs geared to promote business in the state and help starting entrepreneurs begin a successful business. The NDED has special programs and links to statewide resources that help entrepreneurs specifically.

One such program is Invest Nebraska, which has some business plan competitions and numerous events each month that help bridge wide gaps for businesses and help guide entrepreneurs through managed risks.

Hamer said the Department of Economic Development has useful tools, but more work needs to be done.

“We are probably a little slow in some financial programs,” Hamer said. “[One success] is we’ve set up some angel investment programs across the state. However, there’s a divide in converting some of our research into startup businesses.

Photo courtesy of the Nebraska Department of Economic Development

“We need to solve that. Bankers have become more conservative. So we need to help them bridge that gap [between banks and businesses]. We need to have more tools.”

The NDED is constantly promoting new programs and tools for entrepreneurs.

“One of the things we’re working on now is to design programs for higher growth entrepreneurs for doing things in Nebraska.”

Hamer said most of the entrepreneurship projects are broad and success is easier to achieve if a specific target is set.

“From an entrepreneurship standpoint, many of the things we talk about are shotgun things,” he said. “We need to target people who have abilities and want to work towards ideas. Instead of using a shotgun approach, we need to use a rifle approach and see the results.”

Using the NDED’s resources is one way for the entrepreneur to avoid unnecessary and volatile risks. For information about the services provided by the Nebraska Department of Economic Development, visit their website or call 800-426-6505.

The center offers networking opportunities between entrepreneurs with education, mentoring and market research.  Shawn Kaskie, director of the Center for Rural Research and Development, said the program for Entrepreneurship and Innovation in the CRRD focuses on primary market research as opposed to secondary market research. The surveys focus directly on the consumer and the community a business is targeting in order to provide better results for the entrepreneur.

“We offer the full service of professional market research services and to my knowledge, no one else within central Nebraska is providing those services,” Kaskie said. “If a business is thinking of starting, we can help them at a fair price using our student assistance here.”

“When we have entrepreneurs coming into our [program], we see this as a need to make their business better.”

Along with the advanced market research for the client, the center helps identify and develop new markets, entrepreneurial studies in Nebraska, various seminars and workshops focused on professional development and seminars on current issues for entrepreneurs and small business owners.

The center provides “business-to-business” and “student-to-business” networks and programs that will ensure mentoring for the entrepreneurs.  They also provide international business training and professional development for these local companies.

The education provided by the center isn’t limited to those already in the business world. UNK’s program for Entrepreneurship and Innovation educates students in a kindergarten through twelfth grade entrepreneurship training session.

Global Market Research Lab in use by UNK students for a market research class

The CRRD’s entrepreneurship program has grown over the years and Kaskie hopes it will continue to expand with a mentoring program later this year.

“One of the big things for startup entrepreneurs is learning from those who have started a business. We’re likely to be developing a mentoring program,” Kaskie said. “Those interested can be matched up in a sort of mentorship program and it will most likely start up by end of the fall.”

All of these services, including outside speakers who are familiar with challenges facing small businesses, gives the entrepreneur more education about the benefits of owning a small business.

Baldwin Free Enterprise Speaker Series (Rebecca Kousky-Founder/CEO of NEST)

“Through providing these services, that’s why we bring in these outside entrepreneurs, to energize that culture of entrepreneurship,” Kaskie said. “We’re trying to increase that culture of calculated risk taking by bringing in these outside speakers.”

Kaskie said the common trend during these economic times is to make an income and not take risks with starting a business. He also said that through programs such as UNK’s Program for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, individuals are educated on the benefits of taking small business risks.

“Kearney and central Nebraska has been very conservative with spending unlike much of the country,” Kaskie said. “We have not seen much in major declines in services right away. That’s due to again, the hard working Midwest mentality that folks have out here.”

“The challenge with people taking stable jobs is that we would like to see the culture of entrepreneurs grow and see the number of startups increase,” he said. “Generally, the trend is to make sure you are making an income or working for somebody.”

Over 400 businesses claim membership with Nebraska Diplomats. These members come from nearly every corner of the state, representing most cities and towns in Nebraska.

Richard Baier, director for the Nebraska Department of Economic Development, said the primary role of the Diplomats is to build economic development.

“The Diplomat’s function is to promote the state,” Baier said. “They support entrepreneurs who then support others and connect these different entrepreneurs. They do a lot with existing companies and connecting those together.

One event the Diplomats host is the Passport to Nebraska weekend. During this event, other businesses from outside the state visit Nebraskan businesses in an effort to understand what Nebraska is all about. These guests come from all over the nation as well as 10 different countries around the world.

Last year, the diplomats hosted site selection consultant businesses and took them across the state to learn how to do business in smaller towns but also in the larger cities of Omaha and Lincoln. By hosting these companies, it spreads the word about successful business in Nebraska and helps promote business growth in the state.

Diplomats also work with fund raising events in an effort to raise financial support from corporations for different funds that state dollars are unable to cover. This is one way the diplomats are able to have a hands-on role in the fund raising of money for different events.

Baier said one of the greatest benefits of Nebraska Diplomats is the wide variety of members. Not only do entrepreneurs have the resources available but with these networking opportunities, the small business owner is able to have banks, corporations and other entrepreneurs to use as resources.

“Anybody that owns a business in Nebraska would surely be encouraged with the diplomats,” Baier said. “We’re looking at those who have an interest in economic development. We see bankers, we see entrepreneurs. We see a real mix of those folks.

“It’s really interesting in seeing the synergy in this process to see how people connect. It’s not only doing your job by bringing people to Nebraska but it’s also a way to benefit yourself.”

Those interested in joining Nebraska Diplomats can fill out an application on the website. A current member of Nebraska Diplomats must recommend prospective applicants. Baier said the applicant and a Diplomat can easily be matched up. There is also an annual fee of $250 to keep membership, but Baier insisted that all the resources and benefits that come with a membership with the Diplomats makes the fee worth the expense.

“If we really have someone with a passion willing to promote business in Nebraska, we never turn them down.”

It’s no secret that entrepreneurs — well known for working unconventional hours on side projects, often while holding down full-time jobs — fit squarely into that time-strapped demographic. It’s the very nature of those day-devouring schedules that spurred the creation of NxBizSuccess, an online portal that automatically brings entrepreneurs the information they need, often before they know they need it.

“The purpose of NxBizSuccess is to get real-time business information to entrepreneurs when they need it and where they want it — a lot of times, startups need this information yesterday,” said Tonia Franklin, NxBizSuccess web project manager and regional coordinator for NebraskaEDGE. “This portal serves as a way for individuals to go online and receive the information they’re looking for in an interactive way.”

Connected to 9 different social media outlets and boosting an impressive stash of 125 educational videos (ranging in content from small business profiles to how-to interviews with resource providers), NxBizSuccess certainly has plenty of information to dish out. But the crown jewel of the portal’s infrastructure is by and large its prestigious entrepreneur podcast.

Automatically uploaded to users’ iTunes accounts, NxBizSuccess’s instructive podcasts have enjoyed prominence as Top 25 downloads on iTunes U. iTunes U is a subsidiary of iTunes dedicated to educational content, attracting uploads from universities the world over, including the likes of Yale, Harvard and Oxford. Since the portal went public in November 2009, eager entrepreneurs have downloaded over 1200 CDs worth of NxBizSuccess podcast data.

Tonia Franklin, NxBizSuccess web project manager and regional coordinator for NebraskaEDGE

“The economy today is mobile — people are liking this attitude of having everything within their handheld devices,” Franklin said. “Entrepreneurs are very busy people. A lot of Nebraskans hold multiple jobs at once, so obviously time is an issue.”

The entire project was built from the ground up with entrepreneurs in mind. Originally conceived as a way for rural entrepreneurs to educate themselves while waiting for a NebraskaEDGE course to be offered in their area, NxBizSuccess was brought into existence by a grant from the Nebraska Enterprise Fund following an increase in state financing of projects related to microenterprise expansion.

In addition to its videos and podcasts, NxBizSuccess also posts entrepreneurial-themed scholarly articles and keeps a running, statewide list of all available training courses. The portal also recently added a new mechanism that allows organizations such as chambers to have their own private forums.

“This is a way for us to encourage entrepreneurial growth across the state of Nebraska, especially while entrepreneurs are waiting for that EDGE course to come to their community,” Franklin said. “It’s a social platform for entrepreneurs in general to come online, get info and also communicate with other members who are out there and really learn from each other.”

The program is in its infancy but has already seen positive feedback from both the University and from students enrolled.

Over the next several years, the program will offer applied undergraduate research, internships, field placements, camps and study abroad opportunities, among other programs all focused on developing entrepreneurship and agribusiness.

Mark Gustafson is the Founding Director of Engler Agribusiness Entrepreneurship Program

Mark Gustafson, the founding director of the Engler Agribusiness Entrepreneurship Program and the Paul Engler Chair of Agribusiness Entrepreneurship of the Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, has been one of the major pioneers of this program. He said numerous opportunities for students will provide them with tools to help them with their businesses after graduation.

“There will be opportunities for undergraduate research in the area of entrepreneurship,” Gustafson said. “After the students go through the program, there will be a minor for students who complete the program.

“Once they’ve gone through that, they can apply for funding out of events for capitol funds.”

The donation money is dispersed throughout the next ten years, which means most of the projects and different goals of the program will not happen for a few years. The main purpose right now is to get students involved and enrolled.

“The donation money comes in over ten years, so initially we’ll focus on getting the courses in place we need to and identifying students by getting them scholarships,” Gustafson said. “In the years to come, some of these other things will enhance the program.”

Students in this first year were required to already have been enrolled in the college of agribusiness.

“We’ll make sure the students selected have the full experience, including study abroad and internships,” Gustafson said. “I think it will be a really interesting program and provide a great opportunity for kids who want to grow their own business.”

There have already been a couple dozen applicants for scholarships through this program.

Paul Engler and his wife Virginia

Gustafson’s initial focus has been on recruiting students, getting a minor in the  Engler Agribusiness Entrepreneurship set up at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, selecting students that will become Engler Scholars and funding additional entrepreneurial courses.

He also has been involved with beginning the process of developing the Big Red Entrepreneurship Camp next year and identifying and creating study abroad opportunities.

Gustafson said many faculty, including Kathy Thornton, Interim Director of the Nebraska Center for Entrepreneurship, Dean Waller and Jill Brown of the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources and Dean Dickey of the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, are heavily involved with the program and its development.

“Paul Engler is taking an active interest in the program which will be very helpful as we build a network of successful agribusiness entrepreneurs to provide mentoring and internship experiences for the students and speakers for the future lecture series,” Gustafson said. “It is very exciting to be on the ground floor of this program.”

Gustafson expects this program to continue to grow. He said the applicant pool was limited this year but as the years go on, the word about this program will spread. He hopes the program will educate students about the benefits of entrepreneurship in Nebraska at this crucial time in the economy.

“This comes at a really good time from a rural economic development point of view,” he said. “A lot of people tried to bring other industries in and they’re starting to realize that it’s better to try to help businesses within your community grow and to help individuals start businesses.

“Nebraska as a whole is highly dependent on the Ag industry so adding value to the agriculture industry is beneficial.”

To find more about the $20 million gift from the Engler Foundation and watch video of Paul Engler and others check out this article on the University of Nebraska Foundation web site.

NebraskaEDGE aims to create a long lasting learning environment for the state’s up-and-coming small business owners. Since 1995, the program’s been teaching the NxLeveL entrepreneurship course to rural communities in a unique fashion: the course’s instructors don’t come to the communities where they teach so much as they come from them. Trained by NebraskaEDGE associates and certified by representatives from NxLeveL, business leaders from around Nebraska have presented the 12-week, 45-hour course to some 2,500 entrepreneurs during the program’s 15-year run.

“NebraskaEDGE is not the (University of Nebraska-Lincoln) going out and offering this training — we utilize the resources and leaders these communities already have, so as businesses grow, those networks within the community grow as well,” said Marilyn Schlake, associate director of NebraskaEDGE. “We like to see individuals who are seriously thinking about starting a business and have an idea of what they want to do mixed in with experienced business owners who’ve been there, done that and have some battle scars.”

Different instructors teaching each course means a variety of skill sets come to the table, which gives NebraskaEDGE the opportunity to better tailor individual curricula to meet each community’s needs.

“When the experienced business leaders can share their experience with the new entrepreneurs, it helps build that network within the community,” Schlake added. “It also helps those business owners get re-energized, that sensation of seeing new entrepreneurs excited and thinking ‘Oh, I remember that feeling!’”

As most entrepreneurs already demonstrate a natural propensity for outside-the-box thinking, Schlake said the program strives to disseminate as much practical information as possible. NebraskaEDGE walks individuals through all facets of business ownership, starting with business plan formation and plugging along through marketing, advertising strategies and finances. That last item is one new entrepreneurs need to scrutinize the closest, she added.

“We hit the financials really, really hard, so even if they don’t end up being the accountants for their businesses, when they hire and talk with an accountant, they’ll know what all the numbers thrown their way mean,” Schlake said. “As a new startup, the projections you have are almost always going to be off-base, so come back and tweak those often.”

NebraskaEDGE has two upcoming courses scheduled: an August course in Holdredge catering to Phelps and Kearney Counties, and a September course held in Red Cloud that will serve Webster and Nuckolls Counties. For anyone unable to attend either course, NebraskaEDGE offers its entrepreneurial curriculum online as well.

In addition, to teaching entrepreneurial basics, NebraskaEDGE also imbues entrepreneurs with other vital skills, such as knowing who and when to ask for help, and the even important attribute of attention to detail.

“Do your homework: see what opportunities are available, contact experts and mentors who can give you useful feedback,” Schlake said. “Oftentimes with a startup enterprise, you don’t have a lot of facts to go on for your local area. We can find statewide, nationwide data, but in smaller, local regions, it’s hard to find a customer base and numbers you can run. Be diligent and be realistic.”

The startup stories of two Lincoln companies that raised significant outside capital demonstrate the ways the Raikes School fosters entrepreneurial development. Formerly known as the J.D. Edwards Program, the school not only blends computer science and business management education, but also aims to integrate entrepreneurial concepts and examples throughout the curriculum.

“The vision is that we don’t teach entrepreneurship as a senior elective,” said David Keck, Ph.D., director of and professor for the Raikes School. “We are continuously building the entrepreneurial perspective into everything we do from the ground up, without distracting us from also doing accredited, rigorous, scholarly work, but we do encourage students to take entrepreneurship elective courses.”

As an example of this integration of entrepreneurial topics, Keck said in his finance class he has deemphasized bond capital calculations and emphasized equity venture capital calculations like pre- and post-investment value, related risk and return and the number of shares issued to the venture capitalists.

The stories of Allied Strategy and Agile Sports demonstrate an ongoing collaborative relationship between the companies and the school. The school provided a setting, education and tools that fostered startups capable of attracting significant capital. In turn, the companies’ founders, all graduates of the program, give the school feedback on how to improve entrepreneurial education, serve as mentors for students and have hired Raikes School students and graduates as interns and employees.

Founders of both Allied Strategy and Agile Sports say the close relationships they formed at the school with students of similar interests and abilities were important to their companies’ formation.

“Never underestimate putting all those people in the same place and having them get to know each other,” said Colby Thomson, co-founder and chief executive officer of Allied Strategy.

The Raikes School’s setup primes the pump for such relationships to develop. Honors students with interests in business and technology leadership sleep, eat, study, attend classes and work under one roof at the Kauffman Academic Residential Center, modeled after Oxford University’s residential colleges.

In addition, founders of both companies say a unique feature of Raikes School education, Design Studio, was a key component in their businesses’ growth and development.  Design Studio enables juniors and seniors at the Raikes School to work as technologists and business managers on real-world software development projects.

Milestone celebration

For Allied Strategy, the idea for their main offering occurred after the students who would become the company’s founders participated in a Design Studio project with Mutual of Omaha their junior year. Working with the company helped the students understand problems in the insurance industry. Thomson and Allied Strategy’s other founders, Jeff Runyan, Allied Strategy’s chief operating officer, and Britton Nielsen, the company’s chief information officer, realized they could create a solution for some of these industry-wide problems.

“You never really have the ability to be confronted with that unless you see inside of a system, and say ‘Wow, there are huge opportunities here,’” Thomson said.

Companies who want to contract Design Studio projects pay a fee to the Raikes School for the work. Since students aren’t paid for Design Studio work and projects are considered “work-for-hire,” the University of Nebraska-Lincoln doesn’t maintain rights to intellectual property students create, which is an incentive for companies offering students these experiences.

In 2003, while the founders were still students, they decided to contract a Design Studio project with the Raikes School to work on their ideas for Allied Strategy.

In addition, the founders took a business plan writing class available to all UNL students that resulted in an award-winning plan for their company. In 2004, they won the undergraduate division of the Nebraska Center for Entrepreneurship’s New Ventures World Competition, earning a $7,500 prize. Their team was the first Nebraska winner in the competition’s 18-year history.

They also won prizes in Colorado State University’s Venture Adventure competition and were finalists in the NU Venture Capital Competition round, notable since they were still undergraduates.

In 2004, while working on MBAs at the Raikes School, they contracted another Design Studio project.

In 2006 when the founders graduated, Allied Strategy began full-time operations. The company started out in a shared low-rent building with ISoft Data Systems, Agile Sports, and other startups until some of the businesses moved into Turbine Flats, an office space with a collaborative atmosphere where Thomson is the co-founder and vice president of its board of directors.

Allied Strategy group photo

Their first two Allied Strategy hires after the founders came from the Raikes School, and they contracted a third Design Studio project in 2007.

Today Allied Strategy has about 20 full-time employees and plans to hire several more this quarter.  Eight of their current employees were Raikes School students.

Runyan said the ability to hire developers from the Raikes School was one of their top reasons for staying in Lincoln.

Alumni activities provide another win-win for the school and local Raikes School graduate-founded companies. The founders mentor students and speak at the school regularly. As alumni they can attend small closed sessions with Design Studio speakers, which have included Bill Gates, Tom Osborne, Jeff Raikes, and Twitter co-founder Evan Williams.

Allied Strategy’s mission is to improve the insurance experience for consumers, an issue Thomson is passionate about after watching his mother deal with insurance concerns arising from health issues and a house fire. Their first product, SEMCAT, helps insurance agents compare prices of insurance offerings and enables them to interact with consumers on the Web. SEMCAT is now used by thousands of insurance agents in the United States and European Union and supports more than 250 U.S. insurance companies. The team is planning several new products to assist consumers, and releases new features on a weekly basis.

In an email, Thomson said the company received unsolicited acquisition offers shortly before reaching profitability last year.

In addition to the Raikes School, Turbine Flats and the Nebraska Center for Entrepreneurship, Thomson said entrepreneurial resources helpful to Allied Strategy include the Kauffman Foundation, the Entrepreneur’s Exchange in Kansas City and Big Omaha/Silicon Prairie News.

In a future post, Nebraska Entrepreneur will examine the history of Agile Sports and its relationship to the Raikes School.

“Quite frankly, with the economy we’re in right now, if kids don’t have entrepreneurial skills and we don’t focus on entrepreneurial businesses acumen, we’re going to fall desperately far behind other countries,” said Christensen, an entrepreneurship and career education specialist with the NDE, as well as a self-described “passionate advocate for entrepreneurship education.” “We’ve been seen as a beacon of entrepreneurship throughout the world, but if we don’t continue to impart that knowledge and make students realize that entrepreneurship is a career option, then other nations could pull ahead.”

Entrepreneurship in Nebraska: Conditions, Attitudes, and Actions by Eric C. Thompson and William B. Walstad

Most Nebraskans agree with Christensen. Accordingly to a series of 2005-2006 Gallup polls (which later became the basis for a 2008 book on Nebraska’s entrepreneurial climate), four-fifths of Nebraskans feel it’s important for schools to offer entrepreneurship education.

And Christensen believes that education should begin as early as elementary school.

“Entrepreneurial concepts can be infused at any time, from kindergarten on — it’s a lifelong process,” he said. “Elementary school kids already go on field trips to observe traditional jobs: fire stations, police stations, grocery stores. But we’d like to emphasize that communities are also filled with entrepreneurs. We need to make young people aware that entrepreneurs are everywhere.”

Ideally, that formal education would segue into a middle school exploration of entrepreneurship as a viable career path, followed by teaching kids practical entrepreneurship skills during their high school years.

In Cody, Nebraska, for example, that high school level of entrepreneurship education comes with a hands-on twist. The 132-person town has been without a grocery store for nearly a decade, but a recently acquired federal grant has given community leaders the means to re-service a convenience store, transforming it from gas station to grocery outlet.

Conceived as a non-profit, the new grocery store will be staffed by high school students, providing them with invaluable skills and giving the entire community an alternative to driving 35 miles to reach the nearest supermarket. Further down the road, said Christensen, the store will become an incubator for students seeking to start their own small businesses.

Even though most Nebraskans appear to be on board with increasing the level of entrepreneurship education in the state’s schools, and even though Cody’s innovative venture shows how such pedagogical measures can benefit both students and the towns they live in, working new courses into an existing curriculum is no easy task.

“It’s really tough to add classes, because the necessary academic courses are already taking up a large portion of the students’ schedules,” Christensen said. “Fortunately, the bigger the school district, the more options you have in terms of available teachers and slots to offer entrepreneurship courses.”

However, the eventual widespread adoption of entrepreneurship classes will be well worth the struggle. Among other previously stated benefits, students who see the possibilities entrepreneurship confers are more likely to stay in Nebraska, or to return to the state after completing their education, Christensen said.

“Students really need to look at the what their strengths and their talents are, and then think about how that can lead them into a business they’d be excited about,” he added. “A lot of times young people are going to go off and get an education elsewhere, but part of entrepreneurship education is showing them the opportunities that might exist if they return to Nebraska with the skills and knowledge they’ve obtained.”

The Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce, for example, is one avenue for area businesses searching for ways to increase success in the Omaha metro.  The chamber has an entire department devoted to entrepreneurs and works with the businesses to increase development by focusing on economic growth and on membership function.  Over 80 percent of the members are small businesses.

Tom Chapman, director of entrepreneurship and innovation for the Omaha Chamber of Commerce, said the Chamber serves three main functions when it comes to small business owners.  The first is connectivity.  The Chamber helps companies find the right customer or helps point the company toward finding customers.

The Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce provides area entrepreneurs with a launching platform to get businesses moving in the Omaha metro.

“Instead of making hundreds of calls, we help businesses make the right one call,” Chapman said.  “This saves time and stress and gives time to focus on the business rather than wasting time on finding a customer.”

The second step is strategic positioning.  The Chamber helps these companies form a product and establish their base.  The goal is to find something new and innovative that is unique for the small business. This creates a platform for the company to build off of and grow. Businesses are also given guidance on changes that need to be made in order for success to occur.

The third step is finding peers within the business community to help mentor the new entrepreneur.  Establishing a network of business connections provides not only useful information to those starting out but it also provides education in improving success.  Chapman said the Chamber often works with the University of Nebraska in helping businesses find peers and mentors.

“If somebody walked in off the street and wanted to start a business, we help them find the next person,” Chapman said.  “It might be really important for them to meet with somebody with a business plan or a banker or whoever they need to help them move forward.”

Those interested in joining the Omaha Chamber of Commerce can apply online.  Once a member, the Chamber publishes the particular business’ information in a directory. The directory typically sees over 70,000 views each month. Also, members receive attention through special initiatives such as the Buy the Big O! Show and other events.

“Generally, most of our members are successful before they join and we help augment and accelerate that success,” Chapman said.

Those who seek the guidance of the Omaha Chamber of Commerce typically have stronger tools to grow a business but also maintain a business against other businesses by promoting competition.

“People who join the chamber are more likely to succeed than those who don’t,” Chapman said.  “The Chamber will help you make more money, save time and reduce costs.”

On

Located in the same building as the Southeast Community College (SCC) Entrepreneurship Center, the Lincoln Public Schools (LPS) Entrepreneurship Focus Program enables high school students to create plans individually for their own small businesses and in teams for Junior Achievement businesses. Simultaneously, the program uses entrepreneurship as a focus of English, math, social studies, marketing, economics, technology and human behavior classes. In math, for example, students might work on their businesses’ financials; in social studies, students might research demographics impacting their businesses. In the afternoon, students go to their home high schools across Lincoln to take additional classes.

This type of program is rare, said Deb Payne, program developer for business/marketing at Lincoln Public Schools and a teacher in the program.

“People come here from all over the country to take a look at us and see how we are doing,” she said.

The program can point to successes that include academic achievement, young leaders, business competition winners and emerging small-business owners.

In February 2010, two LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program students, Tanner O’Dell and DeVante King, each won $1,000 at the 1^st Annual Make It Happen Student Quick Pitch competition in the Skybox Suites of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Memorial Stadium.

King pitched his idea for customizable athletic wrist bands called “U-Bands” in front of judges, business people, students and other community members in an evening session. The next morning, he spoke on a student panel about the LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program in front of about 400 people at the Nebraska Summit on Entrepreneurship.

“It was a lot of preparing but it was a good experience, I think,” King said. “I feel a lot more confident after doing both of those things.”

Kandace Freeman, another LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program student, also spoke on the panel at the Nebraska Summit on Entrepreneurship. This year, she led a public relations project with another student. The group of eight students wrote a business plan for marketing the LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program and presented the plan at the Nebraska state meeting of DECA, an international organization of marketing students.

“We didn’t make it to finals,” she said, “but we were pretty proud of ourselves. It really helped the program.”

The students’ public relations efforts, which included radio and newspaper interviews, gained eight new students the following semester. Freeman said the group hopes to raise the total enrollment from the current 45 students to 65 next fall.

Freeman, a graduating senior, plans to study social science education at Doane College in Crete to prepare for a career as a history teacher.

“Before I came here there was no way I could get up and stand in front of people and talk,” she said.

O’Dell, a sophomore, won the Quick Pitch contest with his idea for a “Chef’s Table” restaurant, where dinner is a surprise. He said he wants to start this business in the future and may attend culinary school or business school after high school. Now he is writing small business and marketing plans for a business he wants to start while he’s still in high school. He has reserved domain names for a Web site and Twitter and Facebook profiles for the business. He is preparing to present his idea to civic and business groups in a search for funding.

“I actually just got my logo finished yesterday,” he said.

O’Dell said the LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program allows students to focus on their passions, encourages students to think “out of the box” and guides students to create businesses they can take out in the real world.

“I get to come here and share all of my ideas, and it’s just overall a better atmosphere for the way I learn personally,” he said.

In addition to attending events like the Quick Pitch competition, the Nebraska Summit on Entrepreneurship, UNL’s engineering week and SCC’s Business Expo, students learn from and network with local business community members. The SCC Entrepreneurship Center Business Incubator is located in the same building, so students visit businesses downstairs and business owners give presentations to students upstairs. In addition, the incubator has three spots for high school student businesses.

This year for an economics class, students tracked the Lincoln Haymarket Arena project, following the news, listening to speakers, and talking to business people in the Haymarket.

Based on their research, students created a display board representing the types of businesses they thought should be in the Haymarket, importing businesses and services that could come from other countries. At the end of the semester, students gave presentations about their research and ideas. Representatives of the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce attended the presentations, asking and answering questions.

Facilitating this type of interaction between the students and the business community is key to the program, Payne said.

“We are all about real world experiences,” Payne said.

Payne said the idea for the LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program had been percolating among high school marketing teachers in Lincoln for a number of years.  However, it was discussions among the Krieger Family Foundation, Lincoln Public Schools, and other business leaders that started the ball rolling in the spring of 2005.  A committee of people from the business community, Lincoln Public Schools, Southeast Community College and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln began discussions and found ways to partner, launching the program four years ago. One benefit of the partnership includes the dual credit students can receive for some of the LPS Entrepreneurship Focus Program classes at Southeast Community College.  Some of the Southeast Community College credits can then transfer to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

This semester, two student groups created businesses for Junior Achievement projects, one selling “Inspiration T’s” and another selling advertisement space on stress-reliever footballs they handed out at the UNL Spring Games. For both projects, students handled logistics and permissions, developed financial reports, and bought and sold stock in the companies. Both companies were profitable; after selling the stocks, the stock owners – the students—walked away with money in their pockets. However, both groups chose to donate a portion of the proceeds to local charities. One of the groups chose to donate 50 percent of their proceeds.

“They are very generous kids,” Payne said.