Good IDEA Law firm returns to schools with program for teens

By Taryn Hartman Legal News Foley & Lardner is back in the Detroit Public Schools with the second year of its Improving Detroit through Entrepreneurship Advancement (IDEA) program, which itself has undergone some improvement and advancement from last year's pilot curriculum. Designed to teach high-school students how to construct a realistic plan for a new Detroit-based business, the IDEA program is this year offered only at Martin Luther King High School instead of the six DPS career and technical centers that participated in the program's initial installment, primarily to allow for more interaction between the approximately 97 participating students and Foley & Lardner volunteers. "To get a really good work product by the end of the year, we need to allow for more one-on-one mentoring time," said Marcus Sprow, a Foley patent attorney and self-described "quarterback" of the IDEA program, which was launched after firm attorneys decided to establish a unique means of giving back to the Detroit community. Sprow said the need for more time to establish closer working relationships with the students was the biggest lesson the firm took away from IDEA's inaugural year. Over the course of the year, IDEA students gather once a month to hear presentations from local business leaders and Foley attorneys on different aspects of creating and maintaining a small business. The program's second session of the year was recently held at Wayne State University and focused on financing, featuring CEO and Fund Manager of the Renaissance Venture Capital Fund and former Dickinson Wright partner Chris Rizik. Also new to the program this year are mentoring days at King High, when volunteer Foley attorneys actually go into the classroom two weeks after each IDEA session to help students apply the principles they've learned to their business plans, which will take shape over the course of the year. At the program's final session in the spring, a panel of judges will evaluate some of the program's best business plans and award scholarships to the winning students. Sprow explained that the program's goal is to help students come up with a more realistic idea of what a business plan is, what elements it contains and the types of questions would-be entrepreneurs are likely to face along the way. "People were eager to jump on board again," Sprow said, adding that close to half of Foley's Detroit office is involved with IDEA in some capacity. "There was never a question that we were going to continue the program," only a matter of logistics like where and how many students it would include, Sprow said. "I think we're fortunate to have a school that's as enthusiastic as King is to get involved with this," he said. IDEA was originally envisioned as a multi-year partnership with DPS, although Sprow is unsure as to whether it will continue its current model of working with only one high school at a time or grow to include more schools and students. "We'd like to reach as broad an audience as possible," he said. The next IDEA session will take place Jan. 20 and cover human resources matters including the types of people who will make an emerging business successful and legal issues that come up in the hiring and interviewing process. Published: Fri, Dec 4, 2009

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