Toronto, ON (Tuesday, March 9, 2010) – Okanagan College’s “Students In Free Enterprise” or SIFE team has been named the 2010 HSBC SIFE Financial Education Challenge Regional Champion by national charitable organization Advancing Canadian Entrepreneurship (ACE) and proud program supporter HSBC Bank Canada. SIFE Okanagan managed to take home two Regional Champion titles – also being named a Regional Champion for the SIFE Green Challenge.

All Western based SIFE teams were judged by live panels of business professionals, and regional champions were announced on Friday March 5th in Calgary at the 2010 ACE Western Canada Regional Exposition.

The SIFE team from Okanagan College stood out to the judges because of their dedication to their community including aspiring entrepreneurs, current business owners, high risk youth and grade five students. The team was able to connect with these audiences through the outreach projects they have implemented over the past year, at no cost to participants. Highlights include:

• Bridge’s Youth Mentorship - provides financial guidance to high risk youth, teaching the basics of credit management and budgeting through an interactive group session and one-on-one mentoring.
• Student Solutions Business Consulting – provides consulting services to aspiring and current entrepreneurs in the Kelowna area to help launch their venture or improve existing business practices.
• Growing up Greener - a nine week program that educates grade five students on the importance of living green. Program is slated to expand in 2011, from involvement of one school to four.

“Project management, developing partnerships, board meetings, logistics and job satisfaction are all concepts I have learned over the past three years thanks to my involvement with SIFE, explains SIFE Okanagan team Co-President, Deepak Garcha. “I have had the opportunity to obtain hands on experience and apply my in-class knowledge to real world situations.”

Teams have been provided the necessary tools and training from ACE to develop and implement their extensive projects to help others. SIFE Okanagan will now move on to the national level of competition, in both categories, taking place in Calgary on May 10th to 12th.

“The SIFE Okanagan team’s efforts are a great example of the financial education movement and environmental movement our students are leading across this country,” explains ACE President, Amy Harder. “I would like to thank HSBC in particular for supporting our Financial Education initiative nationally, without their support our students would not have the tools needed to lead these projects.”

About ACE
Founded in the mid-1980s, Advancing Canadian Entrepreneurship (ACE) is a national, charitable organization that is teaching and igniting young Canadians to create brighter futures for themselves and their communities. ACE delivers a team-based program called Students In Free Enterprise (SIFE) and an individual-based program, the Student Entrepreneur National Competition. These programs provide university and college students access to real world experience, through the implementation of outreach projects and business ventures that complement in-class studies. Students involved in ACE make a meaningful contribution to their communities today, and discover their potential to achieve an even greater impact as the leaders of tomorrow. Last year, ACE students created 600 jobs, logged 260,000 volunteer hours, impacted 63,000 people, and generated over $40 million in economic activity. ACE is currently established on over 50 post-secondary campuses across Canada.

Contact:
Jaime Szegvary
Communications Consultant, ACE
416.619.8994
jaime@acecanada.ca     

Deepak Garcha
Co-President, SIFE Okanagan
250.486.0632
garchadeepak@gmail.com

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