Two students of the Guyana Industrial Training Centre (GITC) have been awarded grants by the Small Business Bureau to make their ideas for businesses a reality.
Jameel Jacobs and Tarik Collymore were selected as the recipients of the grants, worth $100,000, from a group of 10 students who participated in a Small Business Bureau Entrepreneurship Competition.
An ecstatic Jacobs, who is currently specialising in his trade of furniture making, said he was by no means surprised at being one of the two selected by the Bureau as his business idea differed from his fellow competitors. “My project… was based on furniture making. I [decided on the idea] of repairing furniture ’cause most company in Guyana do not repair furniture. [They] just make furniture and if it damage, you [have] to replace it.”
Now that the first year student has secured the grant, his next step will be networking to acquire his customer base and get his furniture repair business started.
Collymore, the other recipient, was not present at the award ceremony that was held at the GITC last Monday, but his grant was collected on behalf of himself by an associate. He is pursuing studies in Motor Vehicle Repairs.
Before the gathering of students, teachers and media representatives at the presentation ceremony, Shamane Headley, Research and Marketing Officer of the Small Business Bureau, enlightened those present about the agency’s work in relation to students wanting to pursue a career path in entrepreneurship. The Bureau’s mandate, she said, supports and promotes entrepreneurship throughout Guyana and it has been assisting persons that have small businesses or business ideas that they hope to make a reality.
The organisation looks into small businesses having the required tools through finance, training and policy recommendation as well as support their services to ensure business growth.
In 2017 the Small Business Bureau started an in-school entrepreneurship programme that saw 104 students that year and an additional 100 students in 2018 benefit at the secondary level from grants at the amount of $30,000 each. This led to the bureau choosing to take the programme to the tertiary level and GITC is the first school to have benefitted at that level.
In an initial discussion between the parties, it was agreed that there would be an incubator system through the provision of space for entrepreneurs to operate their businesses while attending school.
Dexter Cornette, GITC’s Chief Administrator, said when the entrepreneur class was included in the curriculum, it started with only two hours of teaching on a weekly basis. Although it was seemingly insufficient time for a class, he said it still made a significant impact on the students.
Cornette emphasised the importance of having a skill. “…The slogan that the national TVET body has is ‘Skill is Wealth.’ We believe that once you develop a skill, you have wealth, or whatever trade area you’ve chosen to study in, its wealth. GITC is in the business of providing opportunity for persons like you… An opportunity to persons like you who may have been considered a person who can’t make it [academically]; an opportunity to persons like you who may have been a school dropout; an opportunity to persons like you who may have nowhere else to turn but decided you’re going to go and learn a skill or trade and prove to persons that they are wrong when they say to you that persons in technical education are at the bottom and not well-educated. So when you go to the persons who claim they are so educated and you are not, then you call your price and you charge them for your labour….because if they are so educated, then why are they calling you? You show them what pays you; and that’s why skill is wealth. So we believe in helping you to develop a skill, to have a chance to have a skill that will take you through life,” he said.
Regarding the other students that would have participated in the competition, the Bureau has indicated that it is committed to helping them bring their business ideas to fruition. The other students to have seized the opportunity of competing for the grants were: Shania Gibson, Julius Cort, Marissa Heywood, Abigail Lynch, Emmanuel Paul, Lisa Raymond, Keriann Walker and Ornella Browne.
