WISE Women's Business Center Announces Renewal of WISE

• WISE Women's Business Center has partnered with Whitman School of Management
• The alliance has announced the recertification of WISE as an Entrepreneurial Assistance Center
• The renewal of WISE comes through the Empire State Development EAC program

Through the Empire State Development EAC program, the WISE Women's Business Center announced the renewal of WISE as an Entrepreneurial Assistance Center (EAC), alongside the Whitman School of Management. The award keeps WISE in its designation as one of 26 New York state Entrepreneurship Assistance Centers and acknowledges the continued success of the center in promoting entrepreneurs in business and economic development in Central New York.

Thanks to this three-year Empire State Development grant, the WISE Women's Business Center will increase its Accelerate: Business Plan Intensive and provide individual, free business consulting. Capitalizing on years of success, this grant will extend its services to more Central New York entrepreneurs, assisting them in creating solid businesses, securing capital and navigating NYS certification procedures.

The Accelerate: Business Plan Intensive program, now in its fifth year and launched the ninth cohort in April, is an affordable, 10-week program which delivers entrepreneurs just starting their businesses expert advice, peer support and individualized assistance in creating and refining business plans and financial forecasts that can be applied for loans, securing business partners and other purposes.

Emphasizing WISE's dedication to supporting entrepreneurs in Central New York, Arteika Hunter, founder and managing director of Clean & Glo Cleaning Services LLC, received the EAC Entrepreneur of the Year award from Empire State Development at the 2024 EAC Annual Conference in October.

Arteika opened her janitorial company in August 2022 after more than a decade of experience in the cleaning business. With the aid of the WISE Women's Business Center and other community resources, Arteika is able to continue struggling through the issues of ownership and growing her small business.