Future Founders Welcomes Top Collegiate Entrepreneurs to Chicago for Founders Weekend

March 31, 2017

Entrepreneurs need peer groups to be successful. That’s why we flew our 2017 Fellows to Chicago for the first of two Founders Weekends.

Founders Weekends are entrepreneurial retreats created to build community between our cohort of rockstar collegiate entrepreneurs. Our Fellows benefited from an intensive weekend of coaching, mentoring, team building, and networking with the Future Founders community. Most importantly, they had fun and realized they have a group of friends from around the country who will support them throughout this crazy journey we call entrepreneurship.

Huge thanks to some of the people and organizations who made this weekend possible:

• Our amazing sponsors who are laser-focused on supporting our Fellows in every way possible: Capital One, The Coleman Foundation, The John E. and Jeanne T. Hughes Foundation, Keywell Foundation and Motorola Solutions Foundation.
• Our Entrepreneurs in Residence who gave up their weekends to meet and coach our Fellows: Tom Caprel, Aaron Gillum, Marc Grens, Susan Silver and Tomer Yogev. Read about them here.
• Raman Chada and Catherine Jelinek from The Junto Institute for running a peer-to-peer roundtable and an emotional intelligence workshop to help our Fellows develop as individuals and entrepreneurs. Special thanks to Junto alum Jesse McCabe (Solid Digital) for sharing his story and how to measure business success.
• Future Founders Instructor and serial entrepreneur Victoria Elena Nones (Women In Comedy and Satira) for leading a fun presentation skills workshop that incorporated improv comedy.
• Our Board members, mentors, and Fellowship alumni who came to meet and connect with our 2017 Fellows.

We must also thank:

• Future Founders Board Member Phyllis Lockett and the entire LEAP Innovations team for donating space for the weekend.
• Our friends at CloudSpotter for capturing the weekend and showcasing their cool photo sharing technology.
• Future Founders’ very own Katie Sowa and Ethan Adams for their dedication and hard work in planning a tremendous experience for our students.

While our Fellows have returned home to their respective cities, their journey is just beginning. They are hard at work growing as individuals, as entrepreneurs, and very soon, as job creators. We look forward to sharing more about their progress throughout the year.