COURSE TEACHES ENTREPRENEURS TO MANAGE THEIR SMALL BUSINESS


Course teaches entrepreneurs to manage their small business

BY TIA CAROL JONES
Harold Washington College and the Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce have launched Introduction to Small Business Management. The eight-week course is aimed at helping small business owners. On Tuesday, Dec. 6, there was a celebration for participants who completed the course in late November.

While the course costs $450 and is open to everyone, through the City Colleges of Chicago Future Ready program, the course is free to Chicago residents. The course is held in person at Harold Washington College, located at 30 E. Lake St., and is part of the Continuing Education program.

The Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce noticed a lot of businesses were not getting financial resources or had the knowledge how to do business. It wanted to implement at certification program to teach business owners how to run a business effectively and be more profitable. Jaime di Paulo, President and CEO of the Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, approached the Chancellor of City College of Chicago, Juan Salgado, with the idea.

“There’s a lot of businesses that open up and there are a lot of businesses that also close, because of lack of resources or education. This program is creating an educational process so people can stay in business and grow their business effectively,” said di Paulo, who added, that while there are workshops and other informal pathways for entrepreneurs, he has not seen anything with a model like the Small Business Management course.

The charge of City Colleges of Chicago and Harold Washington College is to provide opportunities for the residents of Chicago. When di Paula came to the City Colleges of Chicago with the idea, they were excited about the opportunity.

“It does a couple of things for us. It allows us to engage the residents of Chicago, but they don’t have to be just residents of Chicago to take the class, to give them an opportunity to take a course to strengthen their business or open up a business,” said Daniel Lopez, President of Harold Washington College, adding that Harold Washington College’s area of expertise is business and entrepreneurship.

The curriculum for the course was created by the faculty at Harold Washington College. Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce came up with the idea and the faculty created the curriculum. It was designed with the purpose of helping small businesses to strengthen or provide them with support. The course was taught by an adjunct professor.

Prior to the launch of the program, Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce had been working with City Colleges of Chicago for a few months. Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce knew what was needed because it was attuned to what was needed because of their connections to the business community.

The first course had 12 students. Keeping the course small meant participants could have one-on-one interaction between the faculty and students, as well as interaction between the students. There is capacity to have as many as 20 students in one course, with an opportunity to expand to have multiple sections. Expansion would depend on interest in the course.

Lopez said the faculty member was confident that the general parts of the course would stay, with some tweaks, but nothing too extensive.

“It’s really a solid curriculum that the College has developed with experts, both who are teaching at the College and professionals that are already doing this work,” he said. “We’re really excited about this partnership with the Hispanic Chamber, we believe this is going to be a model for other programs.”

Lopez would like to see those who are interested in strengthening their business to have the opportunity to take the course.

Di Paulo believes the health of communities is tied to the health of the business. And, the more resources, help and education those businesses receive, the better the communities will be.

The next session will take place in February. For more information, visit https://www.ccc.edu/colleges/ washington/Pages/default.aspx.

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