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FastTracSC poised for Charleston return after statewide expansion
By Dan McCue
Staff Writer
FastTracSC, the comprehensive education program for entrepreneurs that bowed in the Lowcountry two years ago, will be coming back to Charleston in January after a series of courses that expanded the program across the state.
Applications are now being accepted for those courses, which are scheduled to begin on Jan. 8 and Jan. 17 at the College of Charleston Tate Center for Entrepreneurship on Liberty Street. To register, visit the FastTracSC Web site at www.fasttracsc.org.
The series of 10 sessions that begins on Jan. 8 will focus on providing the business insights, leadership and networking skills that are necessary components of starting a new venture.
The second series of 10 lectures focuses more on existing startups trying to grow into mature enterprises.
But if the return to Charleston is now uppermost on the minds of FastTracSC’s local sponsors, including ThinkTEC, a division of the Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce, they’re also still buzzing about the response the series received this past month in communities such as Greenville, Beaufort, Florence, Columbia and Orangeburg.
The 20-program series in a total of eight South Carolina communities marked the first time the program was expanded outside of the Charleston market since its inception here.
“We started here, got a state grant and got it up and running rather quickly,” said Bobby Pearce, an attorney with Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough, who helped bring FastTrac to the state. “Obviously, I’m proud we’re planting little entrepreneurial seeds across the state and are growing our own entrepreneurs rather than solely relying on recruiting corporate headquarters from elsewhere.”
FastTracSC courses are led by experienced facilitators in conjunction with mentor workshop leaders who are entrepreneurs with extensive company-building, bootstrapping and fundraising experience.
Both courses are comprehensive business training programs that address the needs of entrepreneurs refining and writing their business plans and seeking to grow sustainable high-impact companies.
They combine one-on-one coaching, peer learning, guest speaking from the entrepreneurial, corporate, angel, venture capital, legal and financial communities and comprehensive tools to help entrepreneurs produce solid business plans and strategies.
FastTrac is supported by the Kaufman Foundation of Kansas City, and programs are currently provided by 270 partner organizations in 49 states. More than 95,000 participants across the country have completed FastTrac classes since 1993, according to the foundation’s Web site.
Dan McCue is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dmccue@charlestonbusiness.com.
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