History: In 1996 the Business Professional Roundtable (BPR) was launched by a group of Tampa business people. For four years, the initial BPR function was to provide collaboration opportunities between local business professionals and municipalities. The primary focus was as a speakers’ bureau inviting and providing areas leaders another platform for community project updates. From 1998 – 2005, recognizing a need to engage growing local “at-risk” youth population, BPR members developed and supported Literacy Achieved Through Education (LATE) mentoring program. In order to compete for various foundation funding opportunity, BPR applied for and was designated IRS 501 © 3 non-profit entity. Again, members became aware a structured and comprehensive “youth employment / job readiness” program didn’t exist. LATE Program morphed into Helping Young People Excel (HYPE) Program providing a 10-50 Hour job readiness course curriculum. With the Recession of 2009 and economy job lost, BPR developed a 10-30 hour Helping Your People Excel (HYPE) Program “skills and age appropriate” curriculum for adults seeking new skills to help them become re-employed.