The Kentucky Entrepreneurial Coaches Institute (KECI) met in Springfield and Lebanon for their Spring meeting from March 3rd - 6th.
Over 25 fellows from South Central Kentucky attended seminars in the area on sparking entrepreneurship in their communities. SWEDA Executive Director Hal B. Goode is working with a Washington County group on a mini-grant to do just that. Goode, along with KECI fellows have been working with Distributed Education Clubs of America(DECA) instructor Elizabeth Perry on a youth entrepreneurship contest for students at Washington County High School.
The purpose of the mini-grant is to stimulate an entrepreneurial-friendly climate in Springfield and Washington County, to learn leadership by doing and to reflect on the impact of the mini-grant activities after they occur. DECA helps marketing education students select and prepare for careers in marketing, management and for entrepreneurship. Over 185,000 high school students in 5,000 chapters located in the US, Canada, Germany, Mexico and Puerto Rico benefit every year from DECA.
Some of the examples of job creation that came from this program were: E-Bay Farmers Market, Car Detailing/Window Tinting, Landscaping, Hawaiian Ice, Babysitting Service, Technology Support Agritourism, Custom T-Shirt Design, Tutoring, Web Design, Errand Service, House Cleaning and giving lessons in music or sports. Winners for this contest received $500 and a laptop computer.
Winners included:
- Organic Foods - Palmer Grigsby - Garden Produce and production of Salsa and Ketchup
- Custom Meat Production - Jordan Settles - Home Grown Beef
- K.T. Babysitting - Katie Cambron - Babysitting Network
The Kentucky Entrepreneurial Coaches Institute is a unique $2.1 million dollar program that seeks to build entrepreneurial leaders, advocates and coaches in Kentucky's 41 tobacco-dependent counties as a response to declining tobacco income.
The goal is to work with volunteer local leaders and give them the tools to strengthen an entrepreneurial culture, entrepreneurial infrastructure and to coach entrepreneurs. KECI wants the region to become one of the most potential rural entrepreneurship centers in the country.
The work of the Institute is carried out by the University of Kentucky College of Agriculture and the Cooperative Extension Service with a grant from the Kentucky Agricultural Development Board and the Governor's Office of Agricultural Policy.
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