Fresh Start Banking
Fresh Start Banking
Mentorship Program
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Fresh Start
Entrepreneurship
Turning Business Ideas Into Reality
The Fresh Start Entrepreneurship & Financial Capabilities Program for Returning Citizens is a collaboration among several entities with a shared goal of promoting economic empowerment for justice-involved individuals. First Step Alliance developed this initiative with Reentry Survivors, a community organization that has provided entrepreneurship training and employment assistance to returning citizens for more than ten years.
The next cohort will be offered in Boston in the spring 2024 in partnership with Harvard Law School, the Boston Mayor's Office of Returning Citizens, and SCORE, a resource partner of the U.S. Small Business Administration and mentor to America's small businesses.
Past Graduates
Program Goals
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Fresh Start Entrepreneurship aims to provide returning citizen entrepreneurs with the education, mentoring, and legal assistance they need to start and run their own business. The Program builds on the proven ten-year track record of Reentry Survivors' entrepreneurship program, an approved Alternative Sentencing Program now available as a university-level course. Fresh Start Entrepreneurship is designed by and for justice-involved individuals.
The Program's unique curriculum combines entrepreneurship training and money management skill development with individual coaching by peer mentors with lived experience. To help remove barriers to mainstream banking and build credit, participants have access to an affordable bank account and free credit counseling services. Program graduates may also be eligible for a micro-grant to help them get started.
Business ownership represents an alternative path to income and wealth creation opportunities for justice-involved individuals. Fresh Start Entrepreneurship helps people turn their ideas into reality by providing essential business training, personal finance knowledge, individual mentoring, and access to affordable banking products and credit-building resources.
Read our article Entrepreneurship After Prison: Fresh Start Business Ideas for more information about practical and affordable business opportunities for returning citizens.