The Leading Edge - Spring 2010 - PKF - 13

community

Want to buy some lemonade?
Tart drink offers sweet lessons in financial literacy
emonade stands conjure iconic images of America—children, crayon-crafted signs, paper cups and plastic pitchers. They represent most children’s first entrepreneurial experience. Prepared 4 Life, a non-profit organization headquartered in Houston, has built on the lemonade stand concept with national Lemonade Day. Scheduled for May 2 this year, Lemonade Day is a national program designed to teach children how to start, own and operate their own business. It provides an opportunity for an entire community, including families, businesses, faith-based community organizations, youth organizations, neighborhoods and schools to come together for a common purpose—to train the next generation of entrepreneurs to become healthy, contributing members of society. “Prepared 4 Life understands that youth are hungry for information about money—how to earn it, how to save it and how to invest it well,” says Michael Holthouse, entrepreneur and founder of Prepared 4 Life. Lemonade Day is the organization’s No. 1 educational and outreach priority. Last year, more than 27,000 kids registered to create a lemonade stand, selling an estimated 2 million glasses of lemonade and donating almost a half-million dollars to a variety of charities. “The program has been so successful because of its real world experiential learning that takes students beyond the textbook and equips them with the skills needed to achieve success in a real marketplace,” Holthouse says. “Our ultimate dream is to bring Lemonade Day

lemonade vAlues
prepared 4 Life bases its mission on four values:

1 2 3 4

It’s all about the kids. passionate and caring service Doing the right thing every time Commitment to quality and excellence

to every city in America and to children across the country.” Prepared 4 Life empowers youth to become adults who make a difference in society through its core, asset-based experiential programs such as Lemonade Day and Lemonade Day experience. It believes children learn better by integrating life skills, character education and entrepreneurship with engaging experiential, fun activities. “We help youth take ownership of their lives and rise above their obstacles to become contributing and productive members of society,” Holthouse says. Holthouse and his wife, Lisa, founded Prepared 4 Life after almost a decade of research, evaluating and funding many children’s programs through the Holthouse Foundation for Kids. At its inception, Prepared 4 Life worked in conjunction with Houston’s successful After-School All-Stars initiative and followed its engaging, fun mission with afterschool activities primarily for middle school students. In 2007, Prepared 4 Life founded Houston Lemonade Day, which led to the national Lemonade Day and the Lemonade Day Experience, an after-school curriculum for Houston-area middle schools. Prepared 4 Life doesn’t stop with lemonade. It partners with pioneers in the field of socialemotional and academic development to create a solid team of agencies and institutions with proven abilities to promote healthy children and communities. Among these partners are the Search Institute, Baylor College of Medicine and Junior Achievement. “Together we are committed to empowering students to believe in themselves and showing them they can make a difference in the world,” Holthouse says. The Prepared 4 Life “Lemonade” curriculum teaches: • Empowerment (self-sufficiency) • Positive personal values • Commitment to life-long learning • Empathy • Constructive use of time • Healthy social interactions • Goal setting

make lemonade Day
This year, more than 10 U.S. metropolitan areas will host Lemonade Day, having hundreds of lemonade stands and selling thousands of cups of the beverage. prepared 4 Life wants to have more than 100 U.S. cities hosting 1 million lemonade stands by 2013. To find out if your area supports Lemonade Day, visit www.lemonadeday.org. Want to start Lemonade Day in your region? Contact Julie Eberly at (713) 626-5437 or check the Web site.

• Character and integrity • Organizational skills As Holthouse explains, “a child with a good understanding of these fundamental concepts is better equipped with a basic framework to generate wealth and effectively manage it, to create jobs that make their communities robust and to apply entrepreneurial thinking in the workplace. “We also hope to instill in children the idea and importance of philanthropy. Kids need to recognize that money can be used to accomplish something other than buying goods or entertainment, and understand the value of giving and the responsibility of being part of a larger community.” e

The Leading edge

The Leading Edge - Spring 2010 - PKF

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