Northstar Startups is an organization “focused on helping people discover their talents” so they can become self-sufficient. Photo: Provided.
Amarachi Amadike
Standing in line at a food bank can be a time of despair: While most food bank clients are grateful for the opportunity to be fed, many are plagued by the fear that they will not be able to find or keep employment.
Food banks like Grace Pascoe, at Main Street and Ben Lamond Avenue in East Toronto, report that many clients are in jobs that don’t meet their financial needs, and many other food bank clients are unable to find work due to mental or physical barriers, said Janice Waugh, co-founder of North Star Startups.
In 2021, after listening to various clients’ stories as a food bank volunteer, Waugh, along with Bryceson Dodge, founded Northstar Startups, an organization “focused on helping people discover their talents” to achieve self-sufficiency.
“When I met with people, I saw a lot of talent and skill,” Waugh said, “but for a variety of reasons, employment doesn’t work for everyone.”
Waugh, who has been self-employed for most of his adult life, told Beach Metro Community News he wants people to feel the same freedom and value that comes from being self-sufficient.
“If you’re self-employed, you don’t need any formal education or a degree,” she says. “If you’re good at what you do, someone will pay you.”
With this goal in mind, Waugh and North Star Startups volunteers will be visiting food banks around Scarborough to introduce the first steps of their education program. That way you can make money.
“This helps them realise what they love to do, what they’re actually good at and what’s possible for them as a business,” Waugh said.
Following this step, clients will take a business foundation course and then be introduced to the incubator.
“They get mentorship and financial support,” Waugh said, “They get some more workshops on specific issues, and we move forward.”
Northstar Startups helps clients with business start-up costs “up to a few hundred dollars.”
“If you’re just buying a poster to put up on the side of the road, it’s not a big expense, so it’s not something you have to think about,” Waugh said. “If it’s a necessary tool, then it’s a different story.”
Decisions about how much financial assistance a client receives are made by our leadership team, who evaluate each individual situation.
Waugh said the organization’s ultimate goal is to help financially unstable aspiring entrepreneurs design a business that fits their lifestyle.
“Our preference would be for entrepreneurs to pay and for us to reimburse them,” Waugh said, “but sometimes that’s not possible and we end up paying them.”
Northstar Startups works with a variety of organizations, including Scarborough Center for Healthy Communities, Bluffs Food Bank, Soso World Ministries Food Bank and Malvern Family Services.
The organization is driven by the idea of bringing a business incubator model to the Scarborough area, where there are few development programs that support underserved communities, but serves clients in the East York area as well as downtown, Waugh said.
“We do outreach work in Scarborough, but that doesn’t mean we exclude people who we feel we can really help,” Waugh said.
Northstar Startups is run entirely by volunteers, and interested participants have options that match their skills.
This includes an operations team that provides back-office support, technical support, communications and more; mentors who offer business advice to help clients get closer to their goals; and ambassadors who use their personal and professional networks to help with Northstar Startup’s community outreach, partnership development and fundraising.
To become a volunteer with Northstart Startups, please fill out this application form.
For more information about this initiative, please contact us at info@northstarstartups.com.
