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Two Glendale Community College students received $2,500 each from the Make Business Happen at GCC grant for their small business startups.
Laura Morales won for Hands2Teach, a micro school for deaf and hard of hearing children, and Eva Meade will use the grant to grow her custom cake decorating business, Big Day Cakes.
Funding for the awards is courtesy of a donation from Wells Fargo Bank and is made available through entrepreneurship programs at GCC, as well as 10 sister colleges in the Maricopa Community College District, and in cooperation with the Small Business Development Center.
“GCC uses the Wells Fargo donation to fund scholarships and grants which help student entrepreneurs with start-up costs,” Dr. Gabriela Cojanu, entrepreneurship and small business faculty at GCC, shared in a news release. “These scholarships and grants include the Advancing Entrepreneurship Scholarship which covers tuition for GCC’s Small Business Management and Entrepreneurial Studies program.”
GCC has a main campus at 6000 W. Olive Ave., and a north campus at 5727 W. Happy Valley Road.
Students are eligible to apply for the Advancing Entrepreneurship and Make Business Happen at GCC grant. The next grant application deadline is Oct. 22.
Interested students must complete an application which will be reviewed by a panel of judges. Past judges were Mike Bull and Yolanda Facio, advisors from the Small Business Development Center, and Kendra Swensen, GCC business faculty and occupational program director.
Cojanu mentors grant awardees on business growth strategies and best using these funds.
Morales is the owner of Hands2Teach micro school for deaf and hard of hearing elementary school children. Her mission is to provide deaf and hard of hearing children a place where they can learn sign language alongside English and Spanish.
She completed a Deaf Studies Certificate at Phoenix College and attended Arizona State University where she earned her teaching degree in Early Childhood and Special Education. Her experience and expertise come from working in public schools and personal experience as a mom to a deaf child.
Meade is the owner and operator of Big Day Cakes AZ, a cake decorating company, selling custom cakes made to order. She has a passion for sculpting, and is applying her talent to make beautiful cake creations all the way to life-size designs.
