Junior Achievement of South Florida has been developing young entrepreneurs for over 60 years. This year 18 high school teams started and ran real businesses and competed for the local "JA Company of the Year". 

We are thrilled to announce that for the 7th of 8 program years, one of our local teams was invited to compete against 14 teams (out of more than 500) from around the nation, at the JA National Student Leadership Summit (NSLS) being held on June 19-23 in Washington D.C. Congratulations to our JA Fellows Business team Ecossentials, from NSU University School.

The finalist teams will be competing for JA National Company of the Year, Delta Social Impact Award, FedEx Global Possibilities Award and ICE NYSE Foundation Best Financial Performance Award.

In case you missed it, Junior Achievement of South Florida (JA) raised over $1 million at the 2022 JA Business Hall of Fame event, presented by American Express, on May 13th.

Congratulations to the community leaders, who have made a significant impact in their respective industry and have demonstrated vision, commitment to excellence, courageous and bold leadership, and social responsibility:

On May 21st, Junior Achievement joined forces with Broward County Public Schools, education partners like Florida Lottery, businesses and healthcare providers for Books, Bucks & Backpacks, presented by CITY Furniture. Over 1,200 students received OneMain Financial backpacks and had the opportunity to fill them up with books provided by the Early Learning Coalition, PNC piggy banks, JA financial literacy materials and activities, healthcare tips and information, and other “summer success” goodies from our partners to help students avoid the summer slide.

Students and their families enjoyed games and obstacle course activities, the We Florida Financial dunk tank, free food provided by PDQ, Health Foundation of South Florida healthy snack station, the Molina Healthcare photo booth, the Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital cooling station and so much more! 

Special thanks to the Florida Lottery for its contributions as well. They continue to be a dedicated partner to Florida’s students and schools – contributing over $1 billion to education each of the past 20 consecutive years!

Over the course of this school year, more than 150 high school students from 6 Broward County schools participated in the JA Career Bound program, designed to prepare students for work. Students experience industries firsthand, develop work skills through business case challenges and have the opportunity for summer employment.

This month, over 120 students (85%) completed the program and celebrated with graduation ceremonies that included case challenge demonstrations, guest speakers and certificate presentations. These students are well prepared to be placed in summer jobs! Thank you to sponsors Frederick A. DeLuca Foundation, BCPS, Community Foundation of Broward and Florida Lottery for supporting the training, employment coaching and college scholarships for this program.

Next step for these future leaders...a summer internship opportunity. They have the skills! They need you to hire and mentor them on their journey to a successful career!