The Young Entrepreneurs Academy’s biggest event of the year -- the Investor Panel -- will be held Wednesday from 6 to 8 p.m. at Salisbury University’s Perdue School of Business.

Fourteen businesses made up of middle and high school students will be pitching their concept to a panel of investors that will award start-up funding.

One business will move on as the Saunders Semi-Finalist and compete at a regional competition in Rochester, N.Y., against other YEA! winners across the country.

YEA! is an innovative program that transforms local middle and high school students into real entrepreneurial successes.

Throughout the year, students will work in close cooperation with local business leaders, community leaders and educators who use their personal experiences to demonstrate how to develop ideas and objectives, write a business plan, pitch potential investors, obtain funding, register with governmental agencies, establish e-commerce and a web presence, and much more.

By the end of the class, students own and operate fully formed and functioning businesses, which may be carried after their graduation from the program.

Wednesday’s Investor Panel will begin with networking and light refreshments at 5:30 p.m. The event in the Franklin P. Perdue Auditorium is free and open to the public.

Investors who will be participating:

• Dr. Cathy Townsend, Wicomico County Board of Education.
• Dr. Memo Diriker, BEACON.
• Monty Sayler, Bank of America.
• Sandy Fitzgerald-Angello, Pohanka Automotive Group of Salisbury.
• Chris Short, Universal Mortgage.
• Mike Ciorrocco, Universal Mortgage.
• Donna Defino, Hebron Savings Bank.
• Kathleen McLain, 47ABC.
• Andrea Williams, Perdue.
• Dwight Miller, Gillis Gilkerson.

Please RSVP for the event by calling 410-749-0144 or emailing Sophia Smecker at ssmecker@salisburyarea.com.