On December 6th, ECLA hosted an information evening introducing the Annual Student Business Plan Competition organized by the American German Business Club Berlin e.V. (AGBC). Following a welcome on behalf of the ECLA community by Tomaž Cebašek, ECLA’s Senior Assistant to the President, students and teachers from local high school heard presentations about the competition by AGBC members and met with the ECLA students who will be available for advice and mentoring support in the coming months. ECLA is supporting the competition as part of its effort to initiate and contribute to activities that will benefit the larger Pankow community. The competition offers attractive prizes to young entrepreneurs who develop convincing business ideas for a project or a company in Berlin. Participants can work individually or in teams and are required to submit a business plan in the English language by April 16th 2007. A jury will select finalists in May and the prizes will be awarded at a banquet in June.
ECLA students Svetlana Ten (Kazakhstan), Martin Aher (Estonia) and Timur Abenov (Kazakhstan) attended the information evening and were excited at the prospect of helping high school students from the larger Pankow area. Svetlana Ten and Timur Abenov have been pursuing degrees in Business Administration while Martin Aher has acquired relevant experience by participating in entrepreneurial activities parallel to his studies in Philosophy. At the end of the evening, Timur summarized his first impressions: “This is a nice opportunity to meet German high school students and to talk about their ideas and ambitions. I look forward to working with them and hope to help them with all the different aspects of preparing a successful business plan.” Martin added: “I also enjoyed meeting the experienced businessmen who run the competition. Yet I’m curious to find out from whom I will learn more, those that have already implemented their ideas or from the students who are still generating new ones.”
Further information about the competition can be found on the official AGBC website.
By Tomaž Cebašek