Young Founders Lab
Build your start-up in high school
Founded and run by Harvard entrepreneurs
We are an elite incubator for high school students
Young Founder’s Lab is a real-world start-up bootcamp based on incubators such as the Y-Combinator. Students will work in groups or individually to build a revenue-generating start-up.
Why start a business in high school?
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Real world impact
Address real world problem to create impact
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Hands-on experience
Work in tech and build a business
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Connections
Network with peers, entrepreneurs and investors globally
We run the world’s most successful high school programs
4200+
Applications
22,000+
Mentoring hours
62
Countries
$390,000+
In financial aid
Your start-up mentor background
Funded by
Studied at
Worked at
Example founder mentors
Get mentored by entrepreneurs who have raised millions in funding, and worked at Google, Microsoft, and Meta
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FINTECH LAUNCH
Industry: Finance, Tech
Led by Kevin Junker,
Founder & CEO,
Cambridge Uni, Google & Mckinsey alum
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Fintech Launch is focused on bridging the gap between financial products for individuals in markets including the United States, Europe, and Southeast Asia.
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BILLION DOLLAR STARTUP IDEAS
Industry: Tech, Media
Led by Michael Bervell,
Founder & CEO,
HBS MBA & Microsoft alum
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Billion Dollar Startup Ideas is one of the world’s largest generator and aggregator of unicron-level start-up ideas, with a reach of over 850,000 people.
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FAIR OPPORTUNITY PROJECT
Industry: Tech, Non-profit
Led by Luke Heine,
Founder & CEO,
Harvard & YC alum
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Recognized in Forbes, NYT, and the Harvard Education Review, Fair Opportunity Project sends free college application advice to 63,000 public educators and provides free 1:1 mentorship to hundreds of students
YFL Program Structure
Team Based and Individual
Kickoff
Phase 1
Learn to build your start-up
Business fundamentals & business ideation
Phase 2
Build the prototype
Market & user research to build an MVP
Phase 3
Launch your start-up and gain traction
Growth strategies, marketing, sales & negotiations
Demo Day
We will help you build a revenue-generating start-up in high school
What our students say
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AALIYAH
“Got a chance to apply my theoretical learnings in a practical set-up.“
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JOHN
“Grateful for the real-world skills and global connections.”
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Cherry
“At this stage of my life, I never believed I could create a revenue generating startup.”
Our alumni go on to the world’s top universities
In the 2022-2023 admissions cycle, our program alumni were accepted to top undergraduate degrees including every single Ivy League university, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Oxford and Cambridge
7
YALE
acceptances
9
UPENN
acceptances
4
STANFORD
acceptances
15
CORNELL
acceptances
8
COLUMBIA
acceptances
17
UC BERKELEY
acceptances
A survey of +340 alumni that applied to universities in 2022-23 showed that 20% of our alumni who applied to an Ivy League university or Stanford got in - 4X higher than the general rate of acceptance at these universities!
Program Outline
| Program Structure | Team | Individual |
|---|---|---|
| # of Hours of Live Interactive Workshops | 30 | -- |
| # of Hours of One-on-One Mentorship | -- | 12 |
| Goal Output | Launch of a revenue generating business | |
| Cost and Duration | $2900 (4 weeks) |
$3500 (12 weeks) |
| Program Start Date | June 5 | Flexible Date & Timings Earliest Start-date June 5 |
Our Application Process
Building a start-up is hard. That is why we only take the best.
Step 1:
Fill out online application form
Step 2:
Wait as the admission team evaluates your application
Step 3:
Interview with the admissions team
Step 4:
Receive adminssion decision
Step 5:
Begin your entrepreneurial journey
Application Deadlines
Early Decision Deadline: March 17
Regular Admissions Deadline 1: April 21
Regular Admissions Deadline 2: May 12
Program Start Date: June 5
Our Founding Story
Hi, my name is Stephen, and I’m one of the co-founders of Young Founders Lab. I grew up in a small town in Missouri, and the closest thing I saw to a start-up growing up was a pizzeria my friend’s dad started (and shut down after six months). Entrepreneurship was just not something I was exposed to.
Going to Harvard as an undergraduate changed my perspective on start-ups and what was possible. Suddenly, my friends were talking about raising venture capital, running real businesses, and dropping out of school. My two best friends from college each went on to start-up companies, the first, Luke, raised money from Y-Combinator and is now one of our mentors. The second, Greg, has also crushed it - raising tens of millions from world-class venture capitalists like Andreseen Horowitz. I ended up working at McKinsey & Company for a few years before returning to start my own start-up (you’re a part of that start-up if you’re reading this!).
Greg, Luke and I didn’t have any exposure to start-ups in high school (we lived in Nevada, Minnesota, and Missouri, respectively). So, I founded Young Founders Lab to create a bridge for talented, ambitious high school students to build their own startup.Our goal is to give you all the resources you need to succeed as a young professional: training from my time at McKinsey, coaching from world-class coaches, and the structure to build a start-up that generates real revenue.
In that sense, we are part incubator, part professional development training program. For many, this is their first time working on a start-up, but for almost all of our participants it won’t be their last. I can’t wait to see what you’ll build!
- Stephen