Official SLCC Blog

  Social Good Software founder and SLCC alumnus Rick Hernandez (left) with Jon Beutler, Director of the Mill Entrepreneurship Center at Salt Lake Community College.   Rick Hernandez, Founder and CEO of Social Good Software, recently won the highly competitive Morgan Stanley Inclusive & Sustainable Ventures Lab pitch competition, securing $250,000 in exchange for 5% equity—valuing his company at an impressive $5 million. This win not only provides funding to accelerate growth but also positions Morgan Stanley as an investor, significantly increasing the company’s future acquisition potential. Hernandez was one of over 7,000 applicants nationwide—including 250+ from Utah—competing for a place in Morgan Stanley’s six-week, in-house accelerator program in New York. Hernandez was one of two winners selected from Utah. The program offers entrepreneurs of technology-driven startups access to capital, mentorship, and an exclusive network of investors poised to scale high-gro...

 The perfect dress doesn’t exis-   Enter Teresa Jack, dressmaker and entrepreneur. She wanted to design a dress where you could twirl around and not show everything underneath. And—it has pockets. Teresa had an idea for a business making and selling the perfect dress, so she signed up for  The Mill’s Everyday Entrepreneur Program (EEP) at Salt Lake Community College. This 10-week course teaches entrepreneurs to identify and validate a business opportunity, and then help them build a solid ‘go-to-market’ strategy to successfully launch their business. One of Teresa’s first assignments was to find potential customers for a focus group. She posted about her assignment and the dress on TikTok and the video went viral , amassing over a million views. She has since made local and national news headlines in Axios and Fox 13’s The Place . And her business, Chelsea Reece, has exploded from there. @teresa_jack Replying to @thisiskrysten this model is @littlepixiegirlx btw...

This summer Salt Lake Community College, in partnership with Verizon Innovative Learning, provided a free STEM summer camp to 180 middle-school students. The three-week course offered hands-on projects for students to learn valuable skills such as design thinking, coding, 3D printing, augmented and virtual reality.  Students discovered and engaged with their specific interests and new passions within the STEM realm. In addition to new skills, making new friends, and the experience of working on a local college campus, the STEM-based program was provided through The Mill and focused on technology, innovation and entrepreneurship. “Seeing the excitement and enthusiasm radiating from the kids has been so cool,” says Brian Acord, director of Salt Lake Verizon Innovative Learning, who worked to bring the summer camp to SLCC. He says that Verizon contributed over $100k in technology and that the students “had a blast diving into the world of augmented reality, robots and 3D printing.” T...

  The Mill's Everyday Entrepreneur Program's recent graduates and their instructor, Brian Acord. Salt Lake Community College's Everyday Entrepreneur Program (EEP) recently celebrated their latest cohort of refugee and new American entrepreneurs’ graduation. Students from Grenada, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Philippines, Mexico and Pakistan all gathered together to present their business ideas and graduate from the program. Each student had a few minutes to make their pitches, which was part of their qualification for graduation. They shared their stories, talked about their business ideas, goals, needs and expectations. Some of the business ideas included custom made cabinets, a welding company in honor of a parent, a Filipino-Mexican fusion cuisine food truck business and a foundation to help orphans in Grenada. “My goal is to provide support to youth like myself, having been an orphan and poverty stricken,” says Salisha Allard-Blaisdell, originally from Grenada, her fo...