Page 6 | Thursday, November 15, 2012
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University helps children learn business skills Young Entrepreneur Academy teaches middle, high schoolers lessons about starting their own business By Sarah Elizabeth Tooker Staff Reporter
The Culverhouse College of Commerce and Business Administration and the West Alabama Chamber of Commerce are partnering up to host the Young Entrepreneurship Academy, a course teaching middle and high school students how to launch a successful business. The Young Entrepreneurship Academy hopes to foster the ideals of entrepreneurship and innovation in young children in the Tuscaloosa community, as students work in close cooperation with local business leaders, Loo Whitfield, director of education and workforce development at the Chamber of Commerce, said. “The course is seven months long starting in November and meeting once a week for three hours in The University of Alabama’s AIME building,” Whitfield said. “We began recruiting students in
October, and this year there will be 12 students participating, representing both city and county public schools.” Two business professors on campus, David Ford and Rob Morgan, played vital roles in helping the program take off logistically, Whitfield said. Ford, who has personal experience with running entrepreneur camps at the University, helped arrange speakers and field trips for the program. “I have run a successful Entrepreneur Camp on campus for high school juniors for five years, and this seemed like a natural extension and refinement of that camp,” Ford said. “I cannot think of a better way to spend my time than helping young people envision the opportunities and rewards of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship.” Ford also said the dean of the business school, Michael Hardin, provided financial resources to assist with getting the camp off the ground
in the first year. Morgan, whose daughter is a participant this year, said he was eager to contribute because he felt nothing represents the positive power of capitalism more than entrepreneurs. He arranged for the program to be held in the AIME building. “I have a lot of admiration for the person who has the work ethic, passion and backbone to start up their own business,” Morgan said. “I think it’s great that the young people in our community have an opportunity to get some exposure to that in such a well-designed program.” The Young Entrepreneurship Academy was originally founded in 2004 at the University of Rochester and is now in 23 different states with 59 locations. The course has a set curriculum developed for each different location to use to teach the program. It roots the students’ education in business theory, Gayle Jagel,
the CEO and founder of Young Entrepreneurship Academy, said. “We teach young people how to make a job, not just take a job,” Jagel said. “The program identifies a student’s passions and what they’re good at and sees how that can intersect with a business plan.” Whitfield explained the program ends with students applying for a business license in April and participating in an event called Investor’s Panel. “There will be local business men and women at the Investor’s Panel who will invest their actual money to help launch the students’ business and marketing ideas,” Whitfield said. “The students will have six minutes to pitch their business plan in hopes of receiving some funding.” This event has been a part of the program since it first launched, Jagel said. “It was just like Shark Tank met the Apprentice met
CW | Caitlin Trotter
Local business owner Lee Henderson volunteers once a week to teach a business and entrepreneur class for local kids on campus. American Idol,” she said. “I remember one child said, ‘My invention will change the world.’” Jagel said the Young Entrepreneur Academy, which costs $395 per student, is a nonprofit organization and credits much of its success and affordability to donations from national and local
Chambers of Commerce. “The United States Chamber of Commerce said ‘We love what you’re doing, so what if we provide funding for local chambers to run programs in local areas,’” Jagel said. “That funding really helps so the students can afford to take this fabulous class for far less than it actually costs.”
UA student veterans tell Athletic training program stories of service, sacrifice provides first-hand learning
CW | Caitlin Trotter
Grey Westbrook is a veteran of the Iraq war and after spending four years in the military, is now contining his studies at the University. By Adrienne Burch Staff Reporter As Grey Westbrook sat back relaxing at a table in the Ferguson Center, he resembled any ordinary University of Alabama student taking a break from a day filled with classes. But his experiences make him far from ordinary. At 18, Westbrook decided to forgo attending the Capstone and enlisted in the United States Army. Six years later, he has finally returned to the University. There are approximately 800,000 military veterans currently attending colleges across the United States, including many who attend the University. These troops are able to attend advanced schooling and earn a college degree free of charge as part of the G.I. Bill. For Westbrook, the college degree he is working toward was something he always thought he wanted. He was accepted to the University his senior year of high school, but over Christmas break he watched a movie that changed the course of his life. “It was ‘Fahrenheit 9/11,’” Westbrook said. “It made me realize the negative views of the military, and I thought maybe I can change that. Maybe I can make a difference.” Westbrook spent three years in Iraq as an infantry fire team leader. He worked 16 to 18 hour days, alternating between eight hour combat patrols, eight hours of tower guard and eight hours of rest. However, most of these rest periods were not spent sleeping,
but preparing equipment and getting his team ready to go on their next patrol. He said the most important thing he learned from his time overseas was not to take the small things for granted. “People take for granted that they get hot showers, hot food and eight hours of sleep,” he said. “We were lucky if we got these things on a regular basis.” Westbrook said it was the sense of camaraderie and the bond between troop members that made it all worth it. “I was in a lot of crappy situations,” he said. “But the guys you are with are what make it special. I may have been running drills out in Kentucky in the freezing snow, but I wasn’t the only one going through it. I knew the boy next to me was freezing his butt off too.” Westbrook is currently working for a degree in advertising but hopes to return to the military soon after graduation. “I’m going back in the military,” he said. “I loved what I did.” However, for other veterans, leaving the military and starting college represents a fresh start and the beginning of a new career. Zach Boyd, 25, is a Tuscaloosa native who enlisted in the United States Navy right out of high school in 2005. He was stationed on the U.S.S. Rhode Island submarine out of Kings Bay, Ga. For Boyd, joining the military was a way to get away from the real world for a few years to figure out what he really wanted to do. “You don’t have to pay bills or make any real decisions,” he said. Boyd discovered during his time
in the Navy that he was interested in finance, currently his major at the University, through serving as the command financial specialist. Boyd said being back at school has been pretty different. He compared life on the submarine to the movie “Groundhog Day,” where the main character experience the same day over and over again. “The same thing happens every day,” he said. “You don’t really know what day or what time it is or if the sun is out. I just knew when I started getting tired it must be getting close to the end of my watch.” Coming back to school, Boyd left behind many of his closest friends and lost a lot of the camaraderie he had built through his time in the service. He said he traded these friendships for time with his family, including his 2year-old son, who was born two weeks after he was discharged. For U.S. Army veteran Will Suclupe, the transition from life in the military to the University was difficult as well. Suclupe worked in the U.S. Army Medical Department serving two years in Iraq as part of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He helped service members cope with the stress of combat and to better deal with traumatic experiences and mental health injuries. “I enjoyed my experience to serve my comrades and to minimize, as best we could, the injuries that come from the overwhelming, life-altering experience of serving in a combat zone,” Suclupe said. Suclupe returned from overseas in June 2009 and began attending classes at Wallace Community College in August. He then transferred to the University in January 2010 to pursue an undergraduate degree in social work. He said the transition from life overseas to life back in the states was difficult. “I was released from active duty fairly quickly and started college rather soon,” he said. “There was little time to adjust from being in Iraq.” Suclupe said it was difficult for him to relate to traditional students and he felt really isolated, but eventually he found help through the Campus Veterans Association. “The CVA was helpful in providing the opportunity to develop friendships, but more importantly, it gave me a cause to help veterans transition at UA. It provided me many opportunities to continue to share my passion for helping our comrades,” he said. The University of Alabama Office of Veteran and Military Affairs offers many resources to help assist veterans with the transition to University life. They will be opening a brand new office Friday, Nov. 16 at 2 p.m. in B.B. Comer Hall to celebrate the culmination of their Veteran’s Week.
By Madison Roberts Staff Reporter Although athletics stand at the forefront of The University of Alabama, many fail to recognize some of those working behind the scenes to make it all happen: athletic training students. The University offers a graduate program for health studies where students must work as an athletic trainer for a sport within the University in order to graduate, Tina Meyer, a graduate student in the program, said. Meyer works as the graduate assistant athletic trainer for the University’s track and field team while also pursuing her master’s degree in health studies. “I knew I wanted to get my master’s in a health-related field and to practice athletic training,” Meyer said. “I knew Alabama had a fantastic program, and who wouldn’t want to go to school here? It’s definitely a tough program. It’s very sought-after. It’s a lot of long hours, but we all enjoy our job and have fun doing it.” Meyer said her daily tasks as an athletic trainer require her to attend practice an hour before it starts and stay an hour afterward. She also evaluates injuries, participates in medical coverage in case of injuries and helps with athletic rehabilitation. “You have to be hyper-organized, definitely a people person,” she said. “You have to have the knowledge of anatomy and injuries. You have to be able to handle very real and immediate situations.” Athletic training is also
CW | Austin Bigoney
Student equipment managers aid in practice drills. an undergraduate major offered at the University through the College of Human Environmental Sciences. According to the College’s website, the Athletic Training Education Program selects students for admission each spring. ATEP applicants must be students from the general health studies major. About 20 students are selected to pursue the major each spring. While a 2.5 GPA is required to apply for the program, the average of students accepted into the program in 2012 was 3.51, according to the website. Trevyon Tellis, a freshman majoring in general health studies, is applying for the athletic training program in the spring and said although it is a very cut-throat program, he is not worried. “It’s a very competitive program because there is a lot you can do with an athletic training degree, but it doesn’t worry me because I know that I am capable of succeeding,” he said. Rita Polson, a freshman who is also planning to apply for the program in the spring, said she
is worried about the competitive nature of getting an athletic training degree. “It’s a super-competitive field,” she said. “I am worried about it because if I don’t get accepted, I don’t know what other major I would go into.” The six semester ATEP program requires students to accrue clinical experience. According to the ATEP website, students will do two semesters of experience at on-campus athletic training facilities and a minimum of one semester of off-campus training. “Every semester, the undergraduate students switch clinical sites,” Meyer said. “They work very closely with the team athletic trainers and athletes for first-hand, on-the-spot learning.” Tellis said he is excited to start his clinical experiences because the University has a great athletic training program, and he is thankful to be a part of it. “UA is a championship school when it comes to athletic training,” Tellis said. “Being in an environment where I would be working as an athletic trainer would just be unbelievable.”
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