My name is Alan Clara-Moguel, and I am a participant of the Decatur Morgan CEO program. This is a program that seeks to prepare people, especially youth, to be responsible, enterprising individuals who become entrepreneurs or entrepreneurial thinkers at the end of the year.
This year we have 7 student entrepreneurs that are in the process of opening their own business soon. In the fall of 2021, we decided to create Decatur Together Tees, a business that helped us raise the seed money for our individual projects. We felt the need to unite our city due to the range of apparel between Decatur High, Austin High, and Decatur Heritage. How did we do that? By making t-shirts with historical, fun, and notable landmarks in Decatur. This was created locally, from design to vendor.
It was one of the best experiences of our lives. Seeing how the community cares about the future of the upcoming generations helped us understand the impact that can be produced to others. But like everything has a start, it also has its end.
There are a lot of important people in this program that bring their help and time to help us out. Our biggest win is to work hand by hand with our Facilitator, Maegan Schwindling. Mrs. Maegan gives us support, cheers us up, teaches us something new everyday and not only professionally but personally to become better citizens. I have the pleasure to learn from Jeff Parker, my mentor provided by the CEO Program. Mr. Parker has provided me with his unconditional support and uncountable help with my individual project and he was also very helpful during the Decatur Together Tees era.
We all have a lot of potential and bring new services for our community. Each of us came up with an idea related to our skills and passions. The doors that are opened by this program are uncountable and hard to reach for a teen who does not have the network that CEO provides to the young teens.
Alan Clara Moguel is a senior at Decatur High School and one of the student entrepreneurs in Decatur Morgan CEO. During his senior year, and while working two jobs, Alan started his business, Conversate Me!, which focuses on bridging the cultural and language barrier between the English and Spanish speaking communities in Decatur by teaching conversational Spanish and providing translation services. Alan will be attending Berea College in the fall of 2022.
The CEO program was started in 2009 by the Midland Institute for Entrepreneurship in Illinois and has grown to hundreds of high schools in several states. The Decatur Morgan County program was the first to be established in Alabama. Every junior or senior high school student in Morgan County is eligible to apply to the program. The students meet every day for 1.5 hours to plan their businesses, visit Morgan County businesses, and listen to dozens of business leaders who come to the class to speak on business and entrepreneurship related topics. They start two class businesses that raise funding for individual businesses they start in the spring semester. Learn more about Decatur Morgan CEO.
In 2021, seven students, including Alan Clara-Moguel, became social entrepreneurs when they started a company that was focused on embracing diversity and uniting the community.
Their company, Decatur Together Tees, designed a tshirt that showcased several Decatur landmarks. They sold their tshirt and promoted a Decatur Together day where everyone would wear the tshirt to promote unity within the community. This business was featured in a great story produced by WHNT News 19.
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