Budding young entrepreneurs will be able to get ahead in business thanks to an innovative training scheme running this summer.

The Youth Entrepreneurship Initiative of Bermuda's BizCamp programme allows youngsters aged 13 to 18 to develop their business ideas on the courses held at Bermuda College over the next two weeks.

The two weekly 45-hour courses, which are backed by Government and a host of international companies, were launched on Monday and run until Friday, July 20.

Kristien White, assistant to Joe Mahoney, director of the Institute for Youth Enterprise in Boston, and director of Raleigh International explained how the programme works.

"It is about talking to them (the students) about how to recognise a business opportunity and how to take something they are interested in and turn it into a business," she said. "BizCamp takes people through from an idea to how they can actually make it work.

"Sometimes students can come in with this plan which is not realistic or viable, so what BizCamp does is help them develop it into an idea they can do with the resources they have. It is about teaching them how they can take an idea and see it through to its delivery."

First students have to come up with a business plan to launch a new company, getting help and learning from industry experts and guest speakers how to start, fund and run their own enterprise.

They have to write the business plan and present that idea to potential investors with prizes up for grabs for the best one.

Ms White said the course is designed to challenge the students from the outset.

"The first couple of days are spent helping them figure out what they want and what are their business interests," she said. "Then we find out what are their units of sale and what their costs are and that helps you to set a price basically.

"It is just about getting people involved in the programme and its is a fun opportunity. It is about developing their own idea and for us when students find out what they want to do, that is when it gets exciting."

The programme will enable students to bridge the gap between business studies courses at school and starting a career, according to Ms White.

"All of the schools have business studies programmes and public schools use a bit of the curriculum for this programme, so they (the students) will have had some contact with the materials, so, for example, when you say, 'What is your target market?' they understand , but they haven't gone into this in depth," she said. "For the younger students, because they are still young it gives them an idea of what their business studies course will be like and for the older students it gives them a sense of figuring out what they like and what they want to do and what career they want to have.

"It bridges the gap between what they learn in school and how they can apply it. That means they have learnt a skill and have applied it to what is real for them."

Students learn about everything from basic accounting skills to creativity, computer science and public speaking, and even more, as Ms White explained.

She said: "There are a lot of life and career skills that I think that anyone who does the course can get out of it, but for those with entrepreneurial skills they can take it to the next level and they realise that they can do what they want today if they really want to."

Michele Morfitt, 17, who comes from Smith's and studies drama, art, sociology and French at Saltus School in Pemroke, first got involved in BizCamp three years ago when her mother signed her up for a course and she has been helping out there ever since.

"I think it was the possibility of being my own boss that attracted me," she said. "I think my mum heard about it and she signed me up for it.

"I knew it was a computer-based course, which is something that interested me. We basically just made Power Point presentations of our business plans and how we want to go about making business and investing in it."

She said the best thing she got from the course was the confidence to go out and do her own thing.

"It improved my confidence," she said. "Even though I am no longer interested in the business plan I made three years ago, when I am thinking about doing things in the future what I have learnt helps me get my head around it."

In fact Ms Morfitt is already starting to write a success story of her own, going on to develop her own web-site to help promote musicians in Bermuda on an international stage.

Now she is passing on the benefit of her experience to new students.

"It can be rewarding if you are only helping them and giving advice," she said. "I am sure when they start to work on their ideas I will get more involved in helping them out."

The programme, which is now in its sixth year, runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday to Friday, for the next two weeks at Bermuda College in Paget and is free with lunch included.

Anyone interested in following in Ms Morfitt's footsteps and joining the course can visit the Government web-site at www.gov.bm or call the Ministry of Environment, Telecommunications and E-commerce.