SurgeYoung Entrepreneurs

The mission of Surge Young Entrepreneurs is to educate and inspire our youth to thrive in their product, idea or technologic creation while instilling the fundamental skills of business.

At Surge Tacoma, we believe the bright, perseverant youth of our city are the key to our future. We recognize that the solutions to our daily problems come from the students that sit in today’s classrooms. With this in mind, we aim to develop a program to inspire Tacoma’s best and most innovative minds.

Surge Tacoma will provide a tuition-free, yearly program for the 10-12th grade students of the greater Tacoma area. For six-months, a weekly seminar will focus on the skills needed for an entrepreneur. It encompasses a four-part curriculum that includes:

• Intro to Business Skills                 

• Sales and Marketing

• Accounting

• Development of a Business Plan and Pitch

Surge Tacoma intends to partner with Tacoma Public Schools, local business leaders and entrepreneurs within the Startup253 community to teach these skills. The program will be held in the learning lab of Old City Hall as well as a monthly visit to a local business that is a sponsor of the Surge Young Entrepreneurs. High school students will experience realistic simulations that let them see and feel what it’s like to start, manage and build a company. Working with peers, they will tackle the challenges of a start-up – from generating ideas to securing finances, to launching a business. By the end of the program, the intention is to have fundamental skills in business, learn how to turn a great idea into a business plan, perfect an elevator pitch and land the all-important angel investor.

For example, a local entrepreneur has grown his boutique coffee shop from one to six locations. He joins the Surge Young Entrepreneur program by hosting the cohort for a 90-minute presentation and Q&A on product growth and scalability. A local bank partners with the program hosting the group in a bank conference room and discusses bank loans and accounting. Here the group learns not just basic business skills, but also to dress for business meetings and appropriate behavior in board rooms.
In addition to visits to local business partners, students will receive a monthly guest-lecturer from the network of SurgeTacoma entrepreneurs at OCH. They will learn the highs and lows of real-world start-up success stories from the experts. This will likely be the highlight for most students and be a key ingredient to the long-term success of inspiring Tacoma students into the future.

The application for the program will be open to any entering 10th-12thgrade student enrolled in a greater Tacoma area school. The application will be made available on the SurgeTacoma and Surge Old City Hall websites and widely advertised through the public schools. Students that show the attributes of an entrepreneur, such as diligence and motivation will be given priority.

The program will culminate with a “Pitch Night” where teams from the cohort will develop, build, and pitch their product. This will include an Alumni program that invites past graduates, local business leaders, and entrepreneurs. At this event, current and past participants mingle and information on education and employment data can be collected to study. The intention of the event is to continually nurture students and keep them in contact with our network. This long-term engagement is critical for our students’ success.