Fostering Entrepreneurial Spirit: How the Side Hustle Community Supports Student Ventures at Lafayette

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.”  If you’d like to support the Side Hustle Community in some fashion, such as offering mentorship or pro-bono services, please reach out to us.