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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 23, 2001)
got an IDEA but no resources? here's how to make your deamMAllTY. ur LIKE MOST COLLEGE STUDENTS, , old Stephen Sobhani, a senior at Georgetown University, will graduate with a few extracurricular activities on his resume. Last year, for example, he volunteered at a local hospital; cofounded a nonprofit organization called “It’s for the Kids” that benefits children with HIV and AIDS; co-organized and participated in a cross-country bike trip to raise awareness and money for his organization; and read everything the IRS has published about tax exempt status. How did he do it? With determination and some basic entrepreneurial skills that he learned, he says, by default. Call Sobhani an entrepreneur, though, and he’ll laugh. “Anyone can do this,” he says, and he’s right. You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to fund your projects—you just have to think like one. Still, Sobhani and the non profit’s cofounders, Thor Cheston, 21, and Danielle Hurley, 22, picked up some valuable—and marketable— entrepreneurial skills during their year of philanthropy. Whether you want to travel, raise money for a worthy cause, or pursue an artistic endeavor, you too can be a projectpreneur. We talked with some resourceful twen tysomethings who explain how. find inspiration After volunteering at a holiday party for children with HIV and AIDS, Sobhani and his friends were inspired to get more involved with the cause. “When we walked out we thought, ‘We volunteered for three hours today— there’s no excuse for us not to do more,’” he says. The trouble was, they had no idea how to proceed. Several months later someone suggested raising money through a cross-country bike ride, and the idea was the catalyst for Sobhani and his friends to dive in and start fund-raising. Sobhani’s first step was research. He began by visiting the library to search for articles about AIDS and HIV. Next, Sobhani and his friends started their outreach cam paign by writing letters to people mentioned in the arti > 0 J I X < I X X n o t w X X o
