Gabriela Gonjon
Ever wonder what its really like to be a student founder? While you get a glimpse of #StartupLife on our Instagram (@ZahnCenterNYC), its hard to imagine what goes into running a startup while youre in school. We sat down with some of our founders and talked to them about some of the challenges they face. Heres what they said:
Living in Iraq for the majority of my life, Ive always thought about the American dream. Being a student founder makes me feel fulfilled. However, it does not come without its challenges. Balancing school, work, social and startup life is very difficult and can be exhausting. Not worrying about small details and looking at the bigger picture has helped me work through the struggles of being a young entrepreneur. My main goal is to continue learning and being a part of Zahn definitely helps me with that. Although this semester has been hectic, I have gained so much knowledge and have grown more than any other time in my life. One piece of advice I would give to young entrepreneurs is that if they are given the opportunity to be a part of a startup I would definitely do so, even if its not something you want to do as a career. – Baker Mohammed, SprtLook.
It is full of challenges, hard work, creative thinking, and self-sustainability, which are worth a lot at the end. – Enzo Ames, Sporta
The most important thing I've learned from my experiences with the Zahn Center is that you and your team need to be truly passionate about the problem you are solving. The passion is what allows you to push through all the hardships that come with starting your own business as a student, and allows your team to motivate each other. – Labiba Chowdhury, WebNest
Entering into the world of entrepreneurship has been one of the most rewarding decisions that we ever made, but it has its downsides. While putting our passion into solving our problem has taught us how to think and operate in new, exciting, and more efficient ways, we have also learned how to deal with rejection and failure on a continuous basis. That lesson is something that I believe has made us better in every facet of our lives and is something that we'll carry with us forever. – Jaret Wyatt, FreightTran
“Building a startup is an incredibly challenging and rewarding experience. A classroom setting can only teach you so much, so creating our own company allowed us to learn valuable skills and implement them immediately. It fueled our creativity, curiosity, and confidence. ” – Revi Schechter, Vesta
The biggest challenge of being a student founder is juggling a startup, classes and all my other activities. I have to prioritize what is most important for my day and my priority in life is Khamis+Co. There are so many startup founders that advise us to dropout of college as they did so that they can focus on their startups. Being City College students, I know that I can juggle my studies while growing my startup. – Raneem Elsayed, Khamis + Co
Our favorite part about the #startuplife is learning how to make our own mark on the world. – Exostride
We hope youre excited to meet these startups at Demo Day on April 30th where youll help us choose the Audience Favorites & award four startups $1,000 each! You can reserve your FREE ticket today: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/zahn-center-demo-day-2018-tickets-44306150…