Some beneficiaries of Citi Opportunity Project (COPE) participated in a five day Start-Up Academy organized by JA Ghana in collaboration with Aiducation International and Swiss Re Foundation.
The Start Up Academy targets high achieving youth from financially disadvantaged backgrounds who have demonstrated excellence in school and extracurricular activities.
Participating students were drawn from beneficiaries of Citi FM’s COPE project, CAMFED and Compassion International.
The academy took place from January 21 to 25, 2019 at the International Programmes Office, University of Ghana.
The goal of the Start Up Academy is to inspire talented young Ghanaians from disadvantaged backgrounds to identify opportunities around them, live up to their potentials in life and influence their communities positively.
The academy offers an interactive platform for young entrepreneurs to develop business plans for their start-up ideas with training and mentoring support covering the following topics:
Pitching a start-up to potential investors
Customer Needs, Solutions, and USP’s
Success Factor Business Model
Marketing & Market Analysis
Sales
Basics of Bookkeeping
Negotiating & Influencing Skills
Team Work
Time Management
The Executive Director of JA Ghana, Odjobi Kwakye said, “We are delighted to partner with Aiducation International, one of JA’s strongest supporters in Ghana with support from the Swiss Re Foundation, to economically empower the youth through entrepreneurship education. This partnership comes at a time when entrepreneurship is seen as an important driver of Ghana’s economic development. The initiative further supports GhanaGovernment’s development priority of creating jobs and employment for the youth”.
Florian Kapitza, CEO and Co-Founder of Aiducation International said,“I am thrilled to offer our Swiss Re Start Up Academy to motivated talents from financially disadvantaged backgrounds in Ghana. I can’t wait to see them drive and realize their full potential. We are happy to partner with Swiss Re and JA Ghana and are looking forward to a great first Start Up Academy in Ghana.”
Gerhard Lohmann, CFO Reinsurance of Swiss Re said, “Swiss Re is proud to support the expansion of the Start Up Academies into Ghana. The Academies help young people to deliver on their enormous potential to create positive change. Grass roots entrepreneurship has the ability to make the world more resilient, by making communities and families more resilient. We are thrilled that we are able to offer this opportunity to young Ghanaians.”
About JA Ghana
Junior Achievement (JA) Ghana is a nonprofit organization under the JA Africa & Worldwide network, dedicated to empowering young people to own their economic success by enhancing the relevance of education. JA’s unique, experiential programs focus on work readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy and encourage young people to experience the realities of work and life in the 21st century.
JA bridges the gap between classroom learning and the realities of life and work today by helping young people apply learnings innovatively. Our programs aim at empowering young people to generate and effectively manage wealth, create jobs for themselves and others, as well as apply entrepreneurial thinking in the workplace.
Since its establishment in 2007, JA Ghana has reached over 70,000 young people in over 80 schools/institutions across the 10 regions of Ghana. After a 2-year period of dormancy, JA Ghana was officially re-launched in January 2017 and has since reached over 2,500 students in Accra and Tema.
About Aiducation International
Aiducation International is a for-impact organization founded in 2007 that awards merit-based high-school scholarships to talented students from financially disadvantaged backgrounds in developing countries. Aiducation International is built on the believes that education is the most important lever for the individual development of active people and that active people are the most important lever for the economic, political and social development of any society.
In addition to a financial component that gives each student in the scholarship program access to high school, our scholarships support the Aiducation students (AiduTalents) also non-financially: They join an exclusive network of high potentials that meet regularly for seminars, mentorship academies, group mentoring, career rotations, start-up experiences and others. The program empowers AiduTalents to become active citizens and sets them up for a path to realize their full potential and maximally contribute to their country and society in later life.
About Swiss Re Foundation
Swiss Re Foundation is a non-profit organization committed to care and concern for society and the environment. Launched in 2012 by global reinsurer Swiss Re, the Foundation aims to make people more resilient towards natural hazards, climate change, population growth and pandemics, along with other challenges to society’s security, health and prosperity. It also supports community projects and employee volunteering in locations where Swiss Re has offices.
Building on Aiducation’s workshop formats and with funding from the Swiss Re Foundation, Swiss Re and Aiducation developed the Swiss Re Academies in 2014 that are one-week intensive programs staffed by Swiss Re employee volunteers.
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By: citinewsroom.com |Ghana
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