Atlanta Nonprofit Puts Startup Capital in the Hands of Students Who've Never Had Access to It

NEST brings financial literacy, business mentorship, and seed funding to underserved and refugee youth across Metro Atlanta — closing a curriculum gap most Georgia high schoolers never know exists.

ATLANTA, July 28, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- In the schools with the fewest resources, the gap isn't ambition. It's access. Most Georgia high schoolers graduate without ever learning how to build a budget, read a term sheet, or file an LLC; and for students from low-income, immigrant, and refugee families, that gap compounds into a lifetime of lost opportunity.

NEST (New Entrepreneurs Shaping Tomorrow), a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit, was built to close it. NEST delivers business and financial education, mentorship, and real seed capital directly to the students least likely to encounter any of it — proving that the barrier was never talent, only opportunity.

The results speak for themselves. NEST has engaged more than 70 high school students, delivered over 65 hours of business, finance, and marketing seminars at no cost to participants, and raised $29,000 to fund education initiatives and seed student startups. Fourteen student-run companies are currently in development, and NEST has built partnerships with six Georgia-based programs, with new chapters taking root in Florida.

At the heart of the program are NEST Tutoring Seminars — free, interactive sessions led by high school and college mentors covering budgeting, saving, investing, marketing, public speaking, 3D prototyping, and training language learning models. These are the practical skills students say their schools simply don't teach.

Founder of NEST Business Competition Kubby Bhatia's own path to founding the nonprofit began at LaunchX, an entrepreneurship program where he helped build a startup alongside other student innovators. That experience showed him how many young people have creative, impactful ideas but never get the chance or guidance to pursue them. He noticed that while plenty of nonprofits focus on academics or traditional enrichment, few create space for underserved youth to solve real-world problems through entrepreneurship — so, as a sophomore at The Westminster Schools, he started NEST to make business education and startup opportunities more accessible, personal, and community-driven.

"Bringing business to my community and peers means giving them the resources to drive real change," said Bhatia. "A lot of these students have the ideas and the drive already. What they've never had is someone to hand them the tools, the mentorship, and the check. If we invest now, we plant the seed that change is possible."

Take Halelulya Tesfamariam. He came to NEST with a strong idea; he's leaving with a company. His startup, StockSmart, creates inventory and operations software built for field-service businesses like locksmiths, inspectors, HVAC contractors, and mobile mechanics. He won $2,500 in NEST funding — placing 2nd in the Spring 2026 competition behind Sentinel, a disaster-response drone platform that took first place and $5,000. The award let Halelulya file for an LLC and launch a live landing page at stocksmart.pages.dev.

How to Enter — and What Students Could Win

Students don't just learn theory, they pitch. Competitors present original business concepts to a panel of judges for a chance to win funding to launch their idea, plus ongoing mentorship to take it further.

Registration for the next NEST Business Competition is open now and completely free. Here's what it takes:

• Who can apply: Any Georgia high school student, individually or in teams of up to four. Each student or team may submit one pitch, and past winners are welcome to return with a new idea.
• What to submit: A 4-5 minute pitch video (recorded anywhere — a classroom, an office, outside) covering the problem being solved, the product or service, target market, competitive edge, business model, financial projections, and the idea's broader impact and vision.
• Key dates: Early video submissions are due August 10th, with a regular submission deadline of August 24th. The top 10 pitches advance to a live "Shark Tank–style" Finale at the NEST Summit, where finalists get 5 minutes to pitch plus a 2-minute judges' Q&A.
• What's on the line: Cash seed funding — $5,000 for first place, $2,500 for second, and $1,000 for third — plus ongoing mentorship. The funding goes directly toward building the business: materials, subscriptions, domains, and other startup essentials. Students keep full ownership of their ideas.

Whether you have a fully built idea or just a spark of one, NEST is designed to take you further than you thought possible this early. Register today at nestbusinesscompetition.com or contact [email protected].

About NEST Business Competition

NEST (New Entrepreneurs Shaping Tomorrow) is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit expanding access to business and financial education for all students across Georgia. Through free pitch competitions, seminars, mentorship, and seed funding, NEST helps students build real ventures and real futures. Learn more at nestbusinesscompetition.com.

SOURCE Nest Business Competition Inc.