Business Mentor Effort Targets Teens

Business leaders at Universal City’s CityWalk and educators have created a new mentoring program that they say will give a definite boost to students with business aspirations.

The Entrepreneurial Business Academy is a mentoring program designed to teach students the fundamentals of starting a business, from marketing and budgeting to networking. Thirty students from San Fernando High School as well as Fremont High School and Youth Opportunities Unlimited, a continuation high school, both in South Los Angeles, were selected to participate in the program.

“We want [the students] to realize that they can own and operate their own companies,” said Robert Arias, president of the Los Angeles office of Communities in Schools, a nonprofit organization that designed the program.

“We’re hoping that through these experiences they’ll be able to know that entrepreneurial opportunities exist in their communities,” Arias said.

Communities in Schools, based in Washington, worked with officials from CityWalk, UCLA and the Los Angeles Unified School District to establish the program.

Students in the program are matched with a store owner who will serve as mentor and employer. Students and their mentors met Thursday at an orientation session at CityWalk.

The students will work four days a week at a CityWalk restaurant or retail store as part of a paid internship.

They will learn about business management by watching mentors and will attend a class every Wednesday at the UCLA Extension Center at CityWalk that will focus on business mathematics, management and other skills needed to start a business.

As participants in the entrepreneurial program, the teens can earn credit toward their high school diploma as well as credit toward an associate degree.