Hi! I’m Madi, and I am a 2020 Fellow from Newtown, CT. This past May, I graduated from Belmont University in Nashville, TN where I studied social entrepreneurship and music business.
Back in November, I attended Selection Day in Detroit as part of the VFA application process. Even then, the positive energy that the VFA community embodies was contagious, and I could not wait to one day – pending an offer into the program – fully immerse myself in the VFA experience during Training Camp. When it was officially announced that Training Camp would be virtual, I couldn’t help but feel robbed of a potentially life-changing experience. Of course, the VFA Team had no choice but to make the decision that they did, but it still stung.
Fast forward three months, and virtual Training Camp has come to a close. As I write this, I am still in awe of the profound impact hanging out with 200+ people on Zoom every day for the past four weeks has had on me. Never in my life have I felt so at home in a group of people in such a short amount of time, not to mention a group of people I’ve only ever met virtually.
In a world that often feels overwhelmingly cynical and helpless, the past month has proved to me that our future is in incredibly capable, intelligent, compassionate hands if it is in the hands of VFA Fellows. Each day of training camp opened and closed with “Credos”, or short stories told by Fellows about transformative moments in their lives that align with one of VFA’s Credo statements. Day after day, I was amazed and inspired by the bravery, diversity, and wisdom that my fellow Fellows embodied. Being granted a spot in this class of Fellows is an honor I do not take lightly.
Training Camp came to an end Thursday evening with the Closing Ceremony. Each of the 2020 Fellows and team members dressed to impress from the comfort of our couches, poured ourselves our favorite drinks, and came together on our last of many ridiculously overcrowded Zoom calls. We shared our Training Camp reflections, funniest stories, memorable quotes, and most importantly, our sincere appreciation for one another. I have never witnessed another community, not to mention a business organization, put so much intentional effort into making each of their members feel seen, heard, and valued. It’s inspiring to witness, and incredibly uplifting to be a part of.
As much as today marked the end of Training Camp, it also marked the beginning of my Fellowship. As I reflect on the past month, I find myself wishing I had remained more engaged throughout some of the moments when “Zoom fatigue” hit hardest. That ever-so-slight feeling of regret has reminded me how temporary this experience is. It’s a reminder to remain present, curious, and energized, even when the Zoom fatigue hits, because the next two years will fly by and I don’t want to miss out on any of the invaluable opportunities that this Fellowship provides.

Hello there! My name is Jeff Liu and I’m a 2020 Fellow from Virginia. I wanted to share with you a few thoughts on what VFA means to me.
Despite having some idea of what I want to do with my life, like many recent graduates, I carried a ton of uncertainty when I left college. I thought about pursuing higher education to find a job at the World Bank. Perhaps it would make sense to work on grassroots political campaigns. Or maybe I would stick with a safer job at a large tech company. I admit that VFA was just one of many paths I thought might make sense for me. But then I met the 2020 Fellows.
I remember thinking that VFA’s interview process was a bit unusual and I was curious to see what types of people I would have the chance to meet at Training Camp. Before I even had the chance to finish up my final papers and my senior year, the Fellow community was already hard at work. One Fellow organized weekly Zoom calls, where we’d would have the chance to talk about anything and get to know each other before Training Camp started. Two other Fellows reached out to me to chat about startup ideas and many others shared their side hustles or current companies over Slack. I felt that Training Camp could not come soon enough.
And honestly, meeting the Fellow community lived up the hype. This past week was absolutely phenomenal. VFA’s CEO, Amy Nelson, shared her life story and her advice with the entire class. We took on the Pecha Kucha Challenge, where every single Fellow had the chance to share a personal story. I signed an offer for a job in Birmingham and met the inspiring Fellow community already there! Fellow leaders set up events where they shared their advice on networking, cocktail-making, mindfulness, and more. We also had an incredibly touching closing ceremony, endless hours of hangouts on Remo, and a speed dating/friendship-making event! But most importantly to me, this is the week where I really felt like part of a family.
And I can’t believe it’s over already. Four incredible weeks with such an amazing group of people. To be honest, I had doubts about my decision to join VFA even up until the first day of Training Camp. I imagine many others did as well. And yet I can’t imagine not having chosen to be here. I know the next few years won’t be easy and I know there is still so much I have to learn. But there is one thing I know for sure: VFA Fellows are here to support each other, every step of the way!

Hi! I’m Michelle, a 2020 Baltimore Fellow and recent graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I am originally from Long Island, New York and found Venture For America through a referral from a 2018 Fellow. I saw Venture For America as a clear path to entrepreneurship, but have since learned it to be much more than that.
Venture For America has exceeded all of my expectations and with just one week left of Training Camp, I am astounded with the amount I have learned in three short weeks. I have flexed entrepreneurial muscles I didn’t know I had, learned invaluable team working skills, met some remarkable people and discovered more about myself with what I want to achieve during my Fellowship.
My values of integrity, ambition and autonomy are what led me to Venture For America, but I never could have imagined the introspective experience that these past three weeks have brought me during a virtual entrepreneurial bootcamp. I am not talking about the entrepreneurship tips and tricks they share on glamorous television programs or podcasts of success stories. I am talking about the importance of self-care, an internal locus of control, a growth mindset and more. Here are just a few of my life changing key takeaways from Training Camp.

1. Your emotions are separate from yourself and they don’t control you. You control them.
2. No one else is going to tell your narrative, but yourself. To create the ultimate narrative, you need to have an internal locus of control and believe that you are the creator of your own destiny.
3. Ignore and silence any voices in your head that are not self-serving.
4. Your window of tolerance is where you are going to perform at your best so make sure you have strategies for when you fall out of it such as mediation or exercise.
5. Track your wins and be proud of them, but equally track your losses and note what went wrong.
6. As a company founder you must be a jack of all trades and a master of some.
7. Make it easy for people to say no or not respond to you when you are making big asks over email.
8. Most careers in entrepreneurship are NOT linear.
9. Stop seeing success as accomplishments from the past because this can cause you to believe that your intelligence is static. Start seeing learning experiences as successes that indicate your intelligence is forever growing, thus having a growth mindset.
10. Use storytelling in everything that you do!

I’m looking forward to adding to this list during my last week of Training Camp as well as over the course of the next two years during my Fellowship. In conclusion, I vow to bring 100% of my authentic self in everything that I do and am excited about the road ahead.

Hello from another 2020 Fellow here! My name is Avia Matossian and I am a recent graduate from the University of Michigan with a degree in mechanical engineering and concentrations in sustainable systems and front-end product design. A mouthful, I know. Given my unique background and wide-ranging interests, I wondered, “will I find the right community in VFA?”
After learning that Training Camp (TC) would be fully virtual, I initially felt a sense of loss. The amount of community-building and bonding that is such an integral part of TC had been something that I had eagerly looked forward to, and I wasn’t sure how experiencing it from the familiarity of my childhood bedroom in my parent’s house would compare.
This doubt began to melt away during Week 1. VFA’s Credos are a key part of the Fellowship experience, and Fellows have the opportunity to “give a Credo,” or share what a specific VFA Credo means to them, every day of TC. Upon hearing the first stories of vulnerability, passion, and drive that my fellow Fellows embodied, I began to get a better understanding of just how remarkable the 2020 Fellowship class really is. We truly are a diverse and impressive bunch, and it turns out that opening up and showing your authentic self to the world, even if only over Zoom, still makes for an extremely powerful, trust-building experience among our cohort. I have laughed, cried, and been on the edge of my seat during Credos, and feel an indescribably deep sense of connection to some of the personal stories that have been shared in the last three weeks.
This is all to say that my fellow Fellows were the ones who inspired me to share my own experiences last Thursday relating to VFA’s first Credo, “my career is a choice that indicates my values.” Upon finishing my story, I received a flood of support and love from my new VFA community. It was a powerful moment of reflection for me – I hadn’t been sure how successful community-building would be at TC, and here I was just two weeks later, feeling incredibly supported and connected with a group of stunning humans that I know have my back.
Given my lack of business background, there are definitely still moments of imposter syndrome that can creep up throughout TC as I learn more about entrepreneurship. But then I hear about Fellow-led events like a Bob Ross painting tutorial + wine social night that encourage me to continue growing within this network. The sense of community that I already feel with my Fellowship class, developed entirely over virtual Zoom coffee chats, memes, and more, is something for us all to be proud of. Here’s to making the most out of an incredibly unique TC experience!

Hello! My name is Dana Franco. I am a 2020 VFA Fellow from New York City and a proud alumna of the University of Miami where I studied marketing and public relations.
I remember the moment I pressed send on my VFA application back in January 2020 (which feels like years ago). I was curious and excited to learn more about the startup world and the opportunities the Fellowship would bring. As I progressed through each interview round, I got more and more excited as I learned about the VFAmily, Match, and most importantly, Training Camp.
Training Camp has been the perfect opportunity to learn hard and soft skills that I can apply in my startup job. I am extremely excited to be joining The Lip Bar, a Detroit-based cosmetics brand, as a marketing coordinator where I will be responsible for email and text segmentation and website optimization.
Each week we complete skill-based workshops to help us complete that week’s group challenge. However, my favorite Training Camp sessions have been the VFA Essentials, which are sessions led by VFA Team Members and Alumni teaching us how to be the best startup employee.
Three concepts that have been particularly impactful for me are locus of control, growth mindset, and accountabilibuddies.
Locus of Control
Locus of control is a mindset by which you conceptually place the responsibility, choice, and control for what you achieve and what occurs in your life. An internal locus of control attributes your successes and failures to our own efforts, while an external locus of control supports a belief that your circumstances are out of your control. By harnessing an internal locus of control, we take action that is within our control and react to circumstances outside of control in order to achieve a desired outcome.
Growth Mindset
In a fixed mindset, people believe their abilities are fixed traits and that failure is due to a limit of one’s abilities. Alternatively, in a growth mindset, people have an underlying belief that their learning and intelligence can grow with time and experience. Having a growth mindset takes time and effort, but is an essential part of growing as a professional and maintaining an open mind when it comes to feedback, challenges, and failing.
Accountabilibuddies
Your accountabilibuddy is a fellow Fellow that you meet with monthly to hold each other accountable to your personal and professional goals. My accountabilibuddy’s name is Hannah! She and I will be living in different VFA cities but will both be working in marketing. We want to have monthly check-ins to help each other be our best selves over the next two years.
I hope you enjoyed this sneak peek into my Training Camp experience so far! I can’t wait to see what the fourth week has in store.

Hi! My name is Nirav Patel, a 2020 Fellow from Tennessee and a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. I remember the first time I heard the word entrepreneur: Iron Man’s Wikipedia page. It seemed like entrepreneurs were the real life superheroes. I wanted to be a superhero. After four years of failures and confusions in college, I’m glad that I found Venture For America – the ultimate superhero factory! VFA’s secret sauce is the intensive Training Camp which molds us into creative innovators who are ready to change the world.
Today is July 12, 2020. The end of the first week of Training Camp.
Last week was pretty intense. We had a chance to impact a real business by developing a website for them in 24 hours. I am happy to report that we did it! We could see the glow in our client’s eyes when they saw the website. It was the best feeling in the world.
Today is July 13, 2020. The beginning of the second week of Training Camp.
I have a feeling this week will be more intense. We have to create a prototype of a product or service that creates opportunity in the cleaning economy by following design thinking principles. We start off the day with product design lessons from IDEO – the world’s premier design consultancy. I try to furiously write down every word that comes out of their mouth as they drop nuggets of knowledge. I love their principle that creativity is a learned behavior.
Today is July 16, 2020. We are already halfway through Training Camp.
Wow! It has been an intense week of customer interviews, brainstorming, and product development. We got a chance to hear from inspiring founders who have walked the talk and created success. We received a powerful walkthrough on public speaking by Eleni Kelakos who energized me more than coffee ever did.
While the programming has been enlightening, the community has been the most rewarding. The one-on-one breakout rooms, the vibrant Zoom chats, the Credo stories, the challenge teams, the Goal-Setting Groups, the racial and socioeconomic inequality discussions, the meditation groups – all of these experiences have shown me that I’m in the right place. I’m ready to be further inspired by Fellow stories of adversity as we finish off the next two weeks.
I want to give a huge shout out to the magicians’ behind this whole experience: the VFA Team. They work tirelessly to develop a strong virtual community, fix every technical issue, design programs, and answer all of our questions. I know I’ll be ready to provide value at a startup because of them. For now, it’s time to create a prototype with an iron, an upholstery bristle, and a mask.

On a Zoom call of more than 200 fellows at our Training Camp orientation, Julia Kortberg’s bright smile and enthusiastic demeanor lit up the room as I was sitting in Columbus, Ohio. Jad, one of the interns for the VFA Team was blasting some hype music to wake us up from our Sunday 3 p.m. slump. Through a barrage of messages in our Zoom chat, one from another VFA team member caught my eye – “Spoiler Alert: Virtual Training Camp is going to be awesome.” So far, she’s definitely been right!
Though running a program that’s normally in-person completely virtually is a challenge, it’s clear the VFA Team has gone above and beyond to ensure 2020 Fellows still have the quintessential Training Camp experience. Week 1 was chock-full of speakers, socials, and spirit. Here are a few things that stood out to me:
24 Hour Website Challenge
In a partnership with Rebrand Cities, a Detroit-based organization dedicated to putting small businesses online, our entire cohort split into about 40 teams of five to partake in a 24 hour sprint to create a website for a real client. My team was paired with Chene Street Grocers, a Detroit-based company who aims to provide wholesome, local food and a gathering space to their community. After learning everything we could about the company and how to use WordPress, our team presented our final product. In the end, our team was chosen as one of the “winning” websites by VFA, but nothing beat seeing the excitement on the founder Vanessa’s face as she saw her new website for the first time.
Credos
Training Camp has also been very focused on VFA’s credos, five beliefs that speak to VFA’s core values. They are:

My career is a choice that indicates my values
There is no courage without risk
Value creation is how I measure achievement
I will create opportunity for myself and others
I will act with integrity in all things

These credo statements have been integrated into everything we’ve done at Training Camp, from Fellows sharing stories related to the credos before every meeting and our 200+ Fellows being split into five “Credo Houses,” each representing one of the beliefs. This focus has inspired me to reflect on why these credos are important to me and the reasons that I joined VFA in the first place.
Match
Many Fellows, like myself, were still going through the Match process (finding a job with one of VFA’s Company Partners) when training camp began. This week, I got the great news that I’ve finally been matched! I’ll be spending the next two years of my fellowship working as a software developer for CampusESP, a Philly-based EdTech startup. It was so exciting to get the news that they offered me the job, and even better that I got to share the news with all of my new Fellow friends. Since meeting the Fellows, I’m confident that this smart, talented bunch will all find their perfect match soon too!
Overall, this week has been awesome. I’m so impressed with my Fellow class and the VFA Team. In our opening address from Amy Nelson, VFA’s CEO, she said we should “be the fuel that adds to the fire already burning in VFA cities.” It’s clear that the 2020 Fellows are ready to do just that.

Hi! I’m Augusto, a 2020 VFA Fellow from New Jersey. For the last five years, I’ve grown alongside my family’s small business, Quality MT Home Improvement. As I inched closer to graduation in January 2019, I decided to pursue an industry that passionately intrigued me: startups and the innovation economy. Startups and their symbiotic relationship to the venture capital industry were brand new to me at the time, but I pushed forward in networking and learning. The year that followed was incredible. Shortly after graduating, I started an internship as a research analyst at a venture capital firm which led me to apply to Venture For America in the Fall. The rest is history.
Today is July 4, 2020. Venture for America’s Training Camp starts tomorrow.
When I found out Venture for America’s Training Camp would be held virtually this year, I sighed deeply. For reference, Training Camp, a month-long program focused on fostering the Fellow community and teaching vital startup-ready skills, is often referred to by VFA Alumni as the best experience of their Fellowship and early careers. Although the switch to a virtual Training Camp was unsurprising, I found myself holding on to the glimmer of hope that the cohort would be able to come together in person. Certainly, integrating the cohesive VFA node into our professional networks is will prove to be invaluable in the long run. Just as important – if not more important – will be the bonds forged through virtual proximity and shared challenges and goals. I’m excited to see what the program has in store for us tomorrow!
Today is July 10, 2020. VFA’s Training Camp has been a game-changer this week.
In starting to write this, I was pleasantly surprised by how many facets of Training Camp deserve a dedicated post of their own. In truth, the collective TC experience is an amalgamation of what has resonated with each of the Fellows. The short blurb I wrote above, prior to starting TC, is a great indicator of where I have spent my energy best over the last week. While the social events are welcoming and a great place to spill tea, it’s the brief 1-on-1 conversations that have truly resonated with the part of me that loves to appreciate others for their uniqueness. Taking the time to bounce a few questions off a challenge week teammate in between work sessions or diving into an ongoing conversation on Remo has created vividly memorable experiences. Ultimately, I realized that it is now up to me to stop comparing what is to what could have been, and fully embrace this experience by being increasingly present for the passing moments.
Finally, I can’t share this week’s highlights without giving a huge shoutout to the VFA Team. The transition from an in-person skill and relationship building boot camp online is no short feat, but the VFA TC Team has adopted continuous improvement and community building mindsets that are a true display of leadership by example.

Hi, I’m Leena. I’m a VFA Philly fellow and a recent graduate of Barnard College that’s originally from San Jose, California. My VFA claim to fame is being the first to suggest the mascot for 2020 Training Camp’s Credo House #1 – the one and only Barry B. Benson, star of Bee Movie.

My daily alarm goes off at 7:30 a.m. Pacific Time, and Training Camp begins at 9 a.m. sharp. That leaves me just enough time to get ready for the day, walk my dog around the neighborhood, scarf down breakfast, and get settled in front of the computer with coffee.

The required “core hours” of virtual Training Camp are shared between both East and West Coast fellows’ schedules, so there are well over two hundred participants in this Zoom call – all with video on and mics off. The day kicks off with fellow “credos,” or personal testimonials about why one of the five VFA credo statements matters. It’s inspiring to hear my peers speak about their lived experiences that ultimately led them to VFA, and their stories help create a warm sense of community, even on such a large conference call.

Next, we pick up some practical skills from crash courses taught by invited speakers. Before and after a fifteen-minute break that’s just long enough to rest your eyes and just short enough to tempt you to nap, we frantically scribble down notes on WordPress and on your choice of either analytics or SEO. We push through, ignoring our overheated brains and overheated laptops, knowing that a longer break will follow immediately after.

After a luxurious half hour to grab a snack and actually experience sunlight, we’re back in front of our screens. Virtual Training Camp is undeniably exhausting, but it’s also an amazing opportunity to learn and grow. In this session, we hear from a VFA alum about a mindfulness technique that we can apply to our lives and careers. We learn how to distinguish between what belongs within our external versus internal locus of control, and how to respond accordingly. The core hours for today conclude with another round of fellow credos, and another fifteen-minute break.

My challenge teammates and I unanimously decide to sacrifice our last break of the day in favor of a little more last-minute preparation for our client interview. We know that we need to make the most of our time with our client so that we can build a website that accurately represents her brand. We have a very thorough list of questions prepared, and the hour passes quickly.

We have exactly twenty-four hours between the start of our client interview and the deadline for our deliverable submission the next day. Aside from two optional electives on branding and social media, which my teammates and I decide to divide and conquer, the rest of our day is unscheduled work time. This short deadline motivates the longest Zoom meeting I’ve ever been in, but also the most focused and productive as well. Despite our occasional light-hearted banter about pineapples on pizza, all five of us are in the zone, independently and collaboratively working on our client’s website. It’s crunch time.