BUILD Boston has a very unique but focused mission: To use entrepreneurship to inspire disengaged high school students from low-income communities, driving them to pursue higher education and career success beyond. And the method seems to be working: In BUILD’s 15-year history, a staggering 99 percent of students completing the program have graduated high school, and 95 percent have been accepted to college. But thus far, there has been just one key thing missing in the nonprofit’s partnership with Boston high schools (where the aggregate graduation rate is under 43 percent): business incubators to fuel students’ entrepreneurial endeavors. Now, BUILD is unveiling dedicated space at two local high schools where talented, motivated students can unleash their creative and innovative potential and launch real businesses.
BUILD is unveiling dedicated space at two local high schools where talented, motivated students can unleash their creative and innovative potential and launch real businesses.
Today, at the Jeremiah E. Burke High School in Dorchester, Mayor Marty Walsh joined interim BPS Superintendent John McDonough and incoming BPS Superintendent Dr. Tommy Chang for the ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the opening of Boston’s first high school student business incubator.
"You're an inspiration to us all," Mayor Walsh told the students at today's ceremony. "You are going to transform the education not just in Boston but in the country."
The new BUILD program was made by possible by a grant from the PwC Charitable Foundation.
“The opening of the Student Business Incubators present an unparalleled opportunity for Boston high school students to develop the real-world skills and confidence they need to succeed academically and in life,” said Ayele Shakur, BUILD Boston’s executive director.
In addition to holding the freshman BUILD class, these dedicated spaces at the Jeremiah E. Burke High School and Charlestown High School will also host weekly after-school incubator sessions with mentors, and academic sessions with tutors. BUILD staff will now be working from the incubator space four days a week. In addition, the incubators will offer a quiet, professional drop-in haven, where BUILD students are welcome during their study hall or lunch period.
“The school-based Incubators allow BUILD to have a greater impact on school culture, and gives BUILD staff better access to students (and vice versa) and to teachers and administrators,” the organization told BostInno. “We love the fact that now mentors from the business community are at the schools – rather than the BUILD downtown office – every week, helping to build bridges between the Boston business community and these neighborhood schools.”
Finally, BUILD is now sharing resources with the two schools it has partnered with. For example, the nonprofit is developing a state-of-the-art computer lab at Charlestown High this fall that will be made available to all students.
Photo via BUILD Boston.
