More reasons to enroll early: Save $250 on tuition + 50% off your deposit. Enroll by Oct 31.
Build and defend a business idea through rapid iteration in this 2-week program for high school students on the University of Michigan campus.
Rated 4.4 out of 5 for classroom experience by students who took this course in 2026.
Course Description
An early business idea gets stronger when someone asks the question you haven’t answered yet. Put yours forward, hear the critique, and decide what to change.
In this course you will move from an initial idea to a final pitch through fast-paced activities. Explain the problem, customer, and reasoning behind your concept. Then use feedback to test whether the idea is feasible, what makes it different, and how the business would work.
Short cycles of feedback ask you to revise promptly and explain your decisions under time constraints. A field-based experience connects that work with an entrepreneurial environment. Bring what you learn into a refined concept for the final pitch competition, then defend its value and show how it improved. It’s practice in letting a useful question change an idea, not just polishing the way you present it.
This two-week full-day academy for high school students is delivered by the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship in partnership with Summer Discovery. It takes place on the University of Michigan campus in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Students focus on one academy for the full program. Residential and commuter options are available.
What You Will Do
• Generate and clarify an early-stage business idea
• Defend the problem and concept in a structured critique
• Evaluate feasibility, differentiation, and business logic
• Present the idea from an investor’s perspective
• Apply feedback through rapid cycles of revision
• Deliver a refined concept in a final pitch competition
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
• Define a business problem and explain a focused concept
• Evaluate a venture’s feasibility and differences using feedback
• Support an entrepreneurial recommendation with clear business reasoning
You’ll leave with your developed business idea, final pitch experience, and a certificate of completion.
Why Entrepreneurship Skills Matter
An idea needs a clear problem and a reason someone would choose its solution. Looking at feasibility and differences helps you move from “this sounds promising” to an explanation others can examine.
Fast feedback creates decisions of its own. You have to listen, choose what strengthens the concept, and explain the change. That practice can help in the next pitch, product discussion, or team project where an idea needs to hold up to questions.
Who Should Attend?
For students who have completed 9th, 10th, 11th, or 12th grade.
If you like coming up with solutions and want to find out whether one could become a business, this academy gives the idea a real workout. You don’t need a finished venture when you arrive.
Expect to share early work, receive direct critique, revise quickly, and present under time constraints. It suits students who want to try the give-and-take of developing a concept in public.
Recommended by More Than 9 out of 10 Students
Based on students surveyed in Summer Discovery’s 2026 program at the University of Michigan.
Your Summer at University of Michigan
Programs on the University of Michigan campus give high-school students the experience of exploring an academic interest in Ann Arbor, a college town where campus and community life blend together. Tree-lined streets, downtown bookstores and cafés, the Nichols Arboretum, and trails near the Huron River create different ways to experience the setting beyond class.
Students learn alongside peers, navigate a large and active campus, and gain independence through everyday choices in a new environment. The experience helps students understand what university life can feel like while giving them space to deepen an interest without having every next step decided. For families, the program offers a meaningful combination of academic depth, community, personal growth, and clearer direction about what a student may want to study or pursue next.
After successfully finishing this course, you will be awarded a certification completion for your accomplishment.
*This is a preview, not what you will receive