In the News

A service allowing high school students to rent out their parking spots, a teen streetwear brand, and car seat attachments to protect children from overheating were among the winning business ideas at Batavia High School’s recent "Pitch Night."

BARRINGTON, Ill., May 17, 2018 /PRNewswire/ — High School students aren’t waiting to earn their diplomas before inventing a product and establishing a business of their own. Uncharted Learning, a not-for-profit organization, has undertaken the mission to tap into the entrepreneurial spirit of teenagers through their MobileMakersEdu and INCubatoredu programs.

LAKE FOREST/LAKE BLUFF — After creating Safe & Sound Spray in the Lake Forest High School business incubator class two years ago, the company’s owners continue to both sell and improve the product. The owners are Jenelle Frevert and Gwen Driscoll. The two, now college freshmen, are promoting their business both locally — as they did with a self defense class March 13 at LFHS — and nationally — as they did with a pitch on the QVC online shopping network February 23.

A visitor to Deerfield High School’s business incubator class might think they had walked into a modern suite of offices.The class, which is new this school year, directs students to develop their own businesses while they work with mentors and coaches from the local business community. With three separate classes totaling 71 students, the hopeful entrepreneurs work in teams to come up with an idea for a business and develop the model so that it can be pitched to a panel of investors by the end of the year, according to Joe Navickas, who teaches the course.

April 16, 2018 /PRNewswire/ — April is designated as National Volunteer Month and Jason McCann, founder and CEO of VARIDESK, and Isaiah Stanback, former Dallas Cowboy, member of the 2012 Super Bowl Champion New York Giants and co-founder of Steadfast Fitness, are two volunteers to be celebrated. McCann and Stanback are two of approximately 30 business professionals who donate their time to the Coppell High School INCubatoredu entrepreneurial program.

INCubatoredu is on the forefront of cultivating the future potential that young women possess through their entrepreneurial programs for high school students. In addition, INCubatoredu has developed a program for elementary school students called, freshINCedu, to engage these future success stories at a younger age.

"It’s an authentic, rigorous, hands-on program," she said. "We teach them business by having them create their own business. Rather than having them be lectured at and learning vocabulary, like debit and credit and revenue, they actually learn what that means."

NEENAH, Wis. (WBAY) — A one-of-a-kind class in Neenah got some real world experience on Wednesday, pitching to investors for real funding. The first year class called Incubator EDU resembles the ABC show Shark Tank. Students are divided into groups and need to create an actual product to pitch. On Wednesday, students pitched products to a committee to get seed money for their ideas.

Mountain Brook High School (Alabama) is launching a new entrepreneurship program geared toward providing students with an authentic learning experience around entrepreneurship — everything from conceiving, developing and launching a startup business. MBHS announced the new program — INCubatoredu — in collaboration with Uncharted Learning, an innovative nonprofit that develops unique programs for business/entrepreneurship education for K-12 students.