WIT Showcase highlights local teens making an impact

Local teen social entrepreneurs will be on display at the Whatever It Takes (WIT) annual Showcase Event at the downtown San Diego Central Library on Thursday, May 26 at 5:30 p.m. The entire event is run by the 2016 WIT teen entrepreneurs and guests can hear how their enterprises are making an impact locally, nationally and internationally.

WIT is the only college credit social entrepreneur and leadership program for high school teens in the country. Teens learn how to do whatever it takes to design, launch and manage a social enterprise and when they complete the program they earn six units of college credit from the UC San Diego Extension.

Rancho Santa Fe resident Lauren Clark, a senior at Francis Parker, has been a WIT participant for the last three years. She is currently raising money for a survivor of incest rape in the Philippines through her project, Embrace.

“Embrace is a movement in which teenage girls are actively dedicated to lifting each other up while at the same time practicing their own self-love. We wear the bracelets as a symbol of our community and what we stand for as the next generation of female writers, thinkers and innovators,” Lauren said. “This spring we decided to do something special and use our profits to benefit an ‘Embracer’ who is in need of our help.”

The bracelets are currently on sale for $5 at the Spa at The Inn at Rancho Santa Fe as well as online at doingwit.org/#/embrace.

Projects at the WIT Showcase will include everything from Tennis Buddies, which brings tennis to underprivileged/low-income kids in San Diego to Hucklebox, a company that provides a monthly subscription-based art box for teens to engage more with art than electronics.

Banking on Teens by Carmel Valley’s Manali Joshi, a junior at The Bishop’s School, introduces financial concepts to middle schoolers and equips them with the tools to be financially independent.

All of these non-profit projects are built by teens who have found a need in their community.

This year’s event sponsors include Procopio, Ashford, Mission Federal, to name a few. Tickets for the showcase are $32.64 in advance and $43.19 at the door. For more information visit doingwit.org