Budding Entrepreneurs Get a Boost

County Chamber Offers Mentors, Support to Business-Minded Students

It's a Saturday morning, and entrepreneurs Semaj Rashad, Chris Pollock and Noble Okeke are dressed in suits and ties for their weekly meeting.

Their cellphones sit at the ready, next to their laptops. The setting isn't a conference room at a major corporation but a computer room at the Bowie Library. There is no agenda typed on fancy letterhead or administrative assistants. Each businessman takes his own notes.

All three are students at Bowie State University who are realizing their dreams of entrepreneurship with the support of the Prince George's Chamber of Commerce. The chamber recently started a program to provide mentoring and other resources for high school and college students interested in starting businesses.

"My business is called Card Scan Man," said Rashad, 20, a junior engineering and math major who is vice president of programs and events for the student chamber. "We take business cards and help organize them by scanning them into a spreadsheet and an e-mail account. I'm pretty much a contact manager for business and professionals."

Rashad met Pollock, 21, and Okeke, 20, both business majors, at Bowie State. The three banded together because of their interest in entrepreneurship. As they began to develop ideas, they looked for ways to take their budding companies to a higher level and found help at the chamber. President and chief executive James Dula had pledged when taking over the chamber two years ago to help budding entrepreneurs while empowering established businesses.

The chamber was providing mentorship and resources for some students, but Okeke formalized the arrangement by suggesting a similar organization for high school and college students.

The Student Chamber of Commerce, which meets the last Tuesday of each month at the parent chamber's office on Forbes Boulevard in Lanham, has about 50 members. Students are matched with mentors in the senior organization. The young members receive assistance on developing business plans, products and programs. The group's adviser is Rosalyn Pugh, a former county court clerk.

Dula, 58, said he was looking for a way to foster interaction between the county's business community and its youth when he took over leadership of the chamber. He also wanted to establish programs to raise the profile of the chamber, which has about 1,000 members.

As a father and community leader, Dula said he knew young people needed mentors and role models. The student chamber, he said, could fill both needs.

"My philosophy and vision is that the 21st century chamber has to look at the whole county from a holistic perspective, which means we should be involved with our children, the community, the schools, as well as businesses," Dula said.

He said several student chamber members have started businesses or invented products. Pollock, vice president of outreach and communications for the student group, owns Networking Loop, an online newsletter to connect professionals with each other and with networking opportunities. Okeke is president of the student chamber.

Dula said the program benefits businesses by helping them to train the next generation of entrepreneurs.