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Miri Jacobson and Rana Othman: Selling aromatic flowers.

ALBERT DAYAN

Special to The Jewish News

srael's ability to become
a world-class free mar-
ket may well depend on
its young people, like
high school student
Rana Othmen. And Rana,
from Beit Safafa in
Jerusalem, is one of scores of
teens from all over the
country taking part for the
last three years in the
International Young
Entrepreneurs Scheme.
The idea behind it is sim-
ple: a group of 15 to 20 pupils,
age 16 to 18, form a group,
come up with a product and
then set themselves up as a
company, with each member
given a certain job, such as
marketing or managing
director. It is similar to the
Junior Achievement program
' in the United States.
Each group is supervised by
a teacher from Jerusalem's
Van Leer Institute, a leading
Israeli think tank, and a
representative from Israel's

1 1

Entrepreneurs

Small businesses created by Israeli teens
may boost development of the entrepreneurial spirit.

Bank Leumi, which is spon-
soring the project.
"Israel has an enormous
pool of highly talented and
trained workers, but many
are saddled with a mentality
of letting other people take
the initiative and set up
businesses," explains Yossi
Gvir, the project manager bas-
ed at the Van Leer Institute.
"We aim to get young people
thinking about being en-
trepreneurs and developing
self-confidence, initiative and
management skills. The
scheme also teaches them
how to take a calculated
economic risk, set up a
business venture and manage
it efficiently!"

For Rana, it is more than
just a classroom-bound
course. She represented Israel
at an international competi-
tion in Malta in July against
the best groups from every
European country. Rana's
group produced and sold
aromatic dried flowers to a
car insurance company which
gives a package with every
new policy.
"The project is a fantastic
introduction to the business
world," says Rana. "We all
collected flowers from our
gardens, dried them in the
sun and then soaked them in
a perfume my sister brought
back from a trip to Egypt. We
then sold shares in the com-

pany to friends, family and
neighbors.
"Although there were many
theoretical lessons, such as
how to structure a company,
pricing and raising capital,
the most important thing I
learned is to act firmly and
decisively. After I graduate
from university, I want to
start my own business!'
Some of the participants
stand an excellent chance of
employment with Bank
Leumi, whose managers have
been impressed by the in-
itiative and maturity of the
students. "Some of the pupils
are quite simply brilliant,"
comments Hanoch Lieper-
man, in charge of the bank's

Youth Marketing Depart-
ment, "and we have our eye
on some of them.
"It is really encouraging to
see how many business-
minded young people there
are, and they are only the tip
of the iceberg. They were sen-
sible enough to know that
they were not going to rein-
vent the wheel, but took an
existing product and improv-
ed it and then set about their
task in a structured way.
Their ideas ranged from
disposable, scented diapers to
a holder for wall posters!"
Also representing Israel at
the International competition
in Malta was Miri Jacobson,
who discussed her project
with other observer represen-
tatives. Miri was public rela-
tions director of the DeShalit
High School group in
Rehovot, which came up with
a device to prevent drivers
from falling asleep at the
wheel. "I showed how we set
up our project and compared
it with how other schools
developed their products,"
says Miri.

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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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