Dr. Saeed Rahman, a UFV business professor, and two teams encompassing eight UFV students traveled to Calgary to compete in the 2020 Enactus Western Canada Regional Exposition that took place on February 27-28. The event brought together hundreds of students, academics, and business leaders from across Western Canada to celebrate the achievements of future leaders and entrepreneurs.
The two day event featured 52 Enactus teams representing 20 colleges and universities from Western Canada. UFV Enactus’ the Big Brain Literacy Program team comprising of Aneesha Narang, Alisha Mutneja, and Logan Clelland participated in the CWB Financial Education Challenge in a league with six other institutions. The Oak and Earth Candle project team consisting of Addy Schnider, Harpreet Singh, and Gurkirat Samra competed in the TD Entrepreneurship Challenge in a league with five other institutions.
As part of the competition, the UFV teams made two presentations highlighting the club’s accomplishments over the past year in managing its social entrepreneurship projects. The presentations allowed the students to showcase all the hard work and effort they put over the past few months in managing these projects. More importantly, they had the opportunity to demonstrate the current and likely impact these projects have on the Fraser Valley community.
Their Oak and Earth Candle project saw students work towards building a business venture with the aim to support and empower the local community by devoting time and sharing profits with a community-based organization in the lower mainland region. The idea for the project is simple but captivating: to make candles and share the profit. The Big Brain Literacy Program (BBLP), which is a not-for-profit community outreach initiative, aims to help international students at UFV as well students from the local high schools to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to make smart personal financial decisions.
“While we faced challenges and time constraints, our Oak & Earth presentation team was able to deliver a stellar presentation to the sixteen judges at the competition. This 5-minute presentation was not only a fantastic learning experience but also a way for our team to get motivated for future competitions, bond as a team, and learn about each other’s strengths and weaknesses,” says Vladislav Gavrilov, the Vice-President of the club who guided the team throughout the preparation phase.
Regarding the presentation delivered by the BBLP team, Jesse Carson, the club’s President comments, “This 5-minute presentation was a huge success and great learning experience for not only the two presenters but the entire Enactus UFV team. This presentation allowed our team to showcase all of the hard work that had gone into the program to allow over 1000 students to get needed financial education.” Jesse guided the BPPL presenting team during the preparation phase.
“We’re extremely proud of how our Enactus students represented our university and the community at the regional competition. It gave our participating students an excellent opportunity to build networks, learn about projects implemented by other Enactus clubs, and generate ideas on how best we can replicate some of the tools and standards other clubs currently implement to manage their projects” says Dr. Saeed Rahman, the faculty advisor to the Enactus UFV team. “Our participation in the event also highlights the opportunity we have to work together with various community agencies including local business and non-business organizations to solve many of the pressing social problems that are not only relevant to the communities in the Fraser Valley but for the rest of Canada,” says Rahman.
The current leadership team of the club is very optimistic about an even better performance at the upcoming national competition. Jesse comments, “We are all very proud of the success that our teams had in Calgary and we look forward to what they can show us in Toronto at the National Exposition.” “We at Enactus UFV are proud of our presentation team and the success they achieved at the Regional competition. We look forward to taking this experience as a learning opportunity to prepare for our success in the National Exposition,” says Vlad.
At least one team from Enactus UFV plans to compete at the national competition that is expected to be held from May 14–16, 2020 in Toronto.
Enactus UFV is a student-led and student-managed organization that strives to have a meaningful impact on local communities through promoting social entrepreneurship ventures.
The team would like to acknowledge the generous support received from the School of Business with travel and other competition expenses. Thanks go to Dr. Carl Janzen, the School’s Interim Director and Dr. Tracy Ryder Glass, Dean of Professional Studies for their continued support in promoting the club activities and impact within the UFV community.
Enactus UFV is open to all students from all disciplines. The club works hard to develop and implement projects that benefit UFV and the surrounding communities. For those interested in joining the team, please contact the Dr. Saeed Rahman at Saeed.Rahman@ufv.ca or Jesse Carson at Jesse.Carson@student.ufv.ca