Blog | City Startup Labs

City Startup Labs’ Kick-off

On Friday, January 17th, the City Startup Labs pilot kicked-off the first of 4 modules. The Cultivation Module was designed to provide the students with a deep dive into who they are and why they are, where they are. This segment of the program took place over three days, was facilitated by ...

Q&A with Henry Rock

December 13, 2013 By By Glenn Burkins Henry Rock, founder and director of City Startup Labs, say more young black males should be groomed to launch and run their own businesses. On Jan. 17, he and the Urban League of Central Carolinas will launch an “entrepreneurs academy.” When ...

Rockefeller Grant to CSL

“The Rockefeller Foundation is happy to support organizations like City Startup Labs that seek to spur entrepreneurship in communities of color, which are so often under-represented in the current entrepreneurial ecosystem,” said Claudia Juech, Rockefeller Foundation managing director for ...

FastTrac Leading to Start-ups and Job Creation Across the Nation

Posted by: Mark Marich on February 09, 2011 Source: Policy Dialogue on Entrepreneurship Kauffman FastTrac programs in New York and Michigan are leading to new business starts – and the jobs that come along with them. Following an intense entrepreneurial education program initiated by Mayor ...

Kauffman Supports CSL

The City Startup Labs’ Entrepreneurs Academy is using training programs provided by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation for its core curricula. These include: The Icehouse Entrepreneurship Program and the FastTrac New Venture Program. Foundation Overview The Ewing Marion Kauffman ...

TEDxCharlotteED ~ Creating a New Class of Entrepreneurs

(Click image to see video) “Re-imagine young black men as a new class of entrepreneurs, capable of great things – helping in our country’s economic recovery.” Learning on Purpose

Hope for US Economy: Young Black Men as Entrepreneurs

The Christian Science Monitor – CSMonitor.com Lawrence Carpenter knew he always had an entrepreneurial spirit, but he was in the wrong business – the business of selling drugs. After his second stint in prison, it became clear to him: “I made mistakes in my life, and I didn’t want to ...

A Must Read – “The New Jim Crow” by Michelle Alexander

Newsweek What has changed since the collapse of Jim Crow has less to do with the basic structure of our society than with the language we use to justify it. In the era of colorblindness, it is no longer socially permissible to use race, explicitly, as a justification for discrimination, ...

Principles and Best Practices of Successful Business Incubation

In 1996, NBIA’s board of directors developed a set of industry guidelines to help incubator managers better serve their clients. Since that time, NBIA research has consistently shown that incubation programs that adhere to the principles and best practices of successful business incubation ...

Venturing Beyond the Gates

Facilitating Successful Reentry with Entrepreneurship Promoting self-employment among people coming home from prison will be challenging; it will require creativity, perseverance and the ability of professionals across fields to break down cultural barriers to build productive relationships. As ...

From Chained to Unchained

From Chained to Unchained: A New Paradigm to Employment – Self-employment. When most ex-offenders contemplate returning home, one of the first things they consider is getting a job. However, according to a Princeton University Study, “Discrimination in Low Wage Labor Markets,” which ...

A Class of 1000 New Entrepreneurs

City Startup Labs, Inc. was launched in April 2012 as a non-profit in New York. It’s designed to create a new class of distinctive entrepreneurs from within inner-cities America. City Startup Labs is primarily targeting young men of color who are ex-offenders, former gang members and ...

BlackTech Interactive/BlackTechCLT – Spring News

City Startup Labs (CSL) made a recent acquisition of the assets of BlackTech Interactive/BlackTechCLT, a firm started in 2016 in Charlotte by Sherrell Dorsey, Enovia Bedford and Freda Hendley (read announcement). BlackTech Interactive was focused on developing and fostering Black tech talent. ...

REEP News – Spring

City Startup Labs’ ReEntry Entrepreneurship Program (REEP), with the support of an NC Idea BEC Ecosystem grant, has been able to move ahead with the planned launch of the training of a new cohort of returning citizens and justice-involved individuals. The training, slated to begin May 17th, ...

City Startup Labs Acquires Tech Training hub BLKTECHCLT

[March 16, 2021] Charlotte, North Carolina— City Startup Labs (CSL), hybrid accelerator and incubator, today has announced that it has acquired BLKTECHCLT, an inclusive tech and startup community and consulting firm. “I was excited to hear from Sherrell about this opportunity to ...