What is the Lasting Impact of EBV?
The first EBV class (2007) represented a diverse group of veterans who shared in common not only their service to our country, but also their dreams of entrepreneurial success. Many of these inaugural EBV students had already overcome so much - so early in life - that we are confident they are up to the challenges of business ownership. Looking back, they did not disappoint. Today almost 70% of that first class are proud business owners, and four of those students own ventures that generated revenues in excess of $1M in 2009.
After the successes represented by the first offering of the EBV at Syracuse University, the Whitman School was approached by other colleges and universities from across the U.S. that recognized the enormous impact of a model based on leveraging their existing competencies to serve veterans through entrepreneurship. Expanding the EBV to serve more veterans represented a logical next step in the evolution of the program, and thus the impetus to form the EBV Consortium of Schools.
In the three years since the program was launched at Syracuse University, more than 200 veterans have completed the EBV training and the EBV has become an integral component of DoD's efforts to transition military members with disabilities from military to civilian life. In 2009, the Department of the Army named the EBV as a national 'best practice' for programs serving soldiers and their families. "By all accounts the EBV program has developed into a truly world-class initiative that is representative of a novel programmatic approach to addressing a social and economic imperative." Most importantly, the EBV program represents a means to empower America's veterans with disabilities to fight yet again for their own economic freedom in the most American way possible - through entrepreneurship.
EBV Graduate Facts from Syracuse:
69% launched a business venture since graduation
65% still have their venture operational
13% went back to school instead of starting their venture to obtain more education
5% went to work for someone else
16% are still in the planning stage