March 26, 2025

From Passion to Power: Lafayette’s Entrepreneurial Network

Senior DYER Fellows Dina Azar ’25 and Jahi Heath ’25 both have side-hustle businesses on campus. Dina offers luxury nail services, while Jahi has his own clothing line. However, although these are sole proprietorships, they both quickly realized the value of having a community of like-minded entrepreneurs, and so they created Lafayette’s Side Hustle Community.

The Side Hustle Community is designed to be a supportive environment, sounding board, and knowledge pool for Lafayette students. “We wanted to see a community of entrepreneurs where people can rely on each other and navigate uncertainty and risk to create their own opportunities,” said Jahi.

In addition to being a network, the Side Hustle Community offers workshops (for example, on business card creation, etc.) and runs two Side Hustle Fairs, one per semester. At these fairs, a variety of side hustles are on display to the student body. These ventures range as self-published literature to hair braiding services. That is, the Side Hustle Community is open to all business sectors.

Said Dina, “Our goal is to establish a space on campus that normalizes and celebrates entrepreneurship by creating a dedicated community.”

The next Side Hustle Fair will take place at the Farinon College Center at Lafayette on Thursday, March 27th, 11 AM – 1 PM.

If you’d like to support or connect with the Side Hustle Community, please contact the Dyer Center for more information.