Small Business Owners Prepare to Grow after Completing the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program at City Colleges of Chicago
Nearly 150 Chicago-area small business owners are alumni of the program
CHICAGO – September 13, 2013 - City Colleges of Chicago, the largest community college system in Illinois, celebrated the graduation of the most recent class of business owners from the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program. This initiative aims to unlock the potential of small businesses across the United States to grow and create jobs by providing them with greater access to business education, financial capital and business support services. The business owners who graduated today represent a wide variety of industries from high end furniture to green cleaning building services, from event management to interior design, and are located throughout the City of Chicago.
The keynote speaker at graduation was Julia Stamberger, president and CEO of GoPicnic, the pioneer and leader in nutritionally balanced, portable and delicious ready-to-eat meals. Stamberger who founded GoPicnic in 2006 at the age of 31, is recognized as an innovator, transformational leader and a tremendous champion of small businesses. She offered business advice based on her experience as an entrepreneur.
“Entrepreneurship serves as the world’s economic growth engine and critically important to creating good jobs. Many of today’s Fortune 500 companies and industry powerhouses were started by individuals that created their own niche and never looked back. I hope to inspire the small business owners to dream big, rise to the challenge and take the quality education they’ve gained through this program to successfully expand their businesses,” said Stamberger.
The 10,000 Small Businesses program is housed at Harold Washington College – the City College with a focus on business, entrepreneurship and professional services through the College to Careers initiative, which partners faculty with employers and four year colleges to ensure students are prepared to hit the ground running in fast growing fields.
“By supporting the growth of small businesses, we’re supporting the local economy and we’re supporting our students,” said Donald J. Laackman, president of Harold Washington College. “As the graduates of this program expand their businesses, they create employment opportunities for Chicagoans, including graduates of City Colleges of Chicago.”
The program launched in Chicago in September 2011, committing $25 million for small business loans, business education and grants for supporting community partners. Since then, 138 small business owners from the Chicago area have completed the program. Together these businesses represent aggregate revenues of approximately $131 million and more than 2,000 employees.
The small business owners spent 11 weeks at Harold Washington College completing more than 100 instructional hours. The curriculum covered accounting, human resources, negotiation and marketing, among other topics. The program also included one-on-one business advising, accounting workshops and advice from Goldman Sachs professionals.
Chicago is one of 14 locations for 10,000 Small Businesses in the United States. Nationally, more than 1,400 small business owners have participated in the program and 99 percent have graduated. Approximately 63 percent increased their revenues within six months of graduation and 47 percent created new jobs.
Applications are being accepted now for the next session. For information about the business and management education program and to register for an information session or webinar, please visit: http://www.ccc.edu/10ksb.
About City Colleges of Chicago
City Colleges of Chicago is the largest community college system in Illinois and one of the largest in the nation, with 5,500 faculty and staff serving 115,000 students annually at seven colleges and six satellite sites citywide. City Colleges of Chicago is in the midst of a Reinvention, a collaborative effort to review and revise City Colleges programs and practices to ensure students leave City Colleges college-ready, career-ready and prepared to pursue their life's goals.
City Colleges of Chicago includes seven colleges: Richard J. Daley College, Kennedy-King College, Malcolm X College, Olive-Harvey College, Harry S. Truman College, Harold Washington College and Wilbur Wright College. The system also oversees the Washburne Culinary Institute, the French Pastry School, two restaurants, five Child Development Centers, the Center for Distance Learning, the Workforce Institute, the public broadcast station WYCC-TV Channel 20 and radio station WKKC-FM 89.3. For more information about City Colleges of Chicago, call: (773) COLLEGE or visit www.ccc.edu.
Lauren Russ at 773.868.0966 or lauren@connectcomsinc.com
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