At a youth job conference in Florida, kids with

a passion go after it
By Tiana Headley, Miami Herald, adapted by Newsela staff on 08.19.19
Word Count 557
Level MAX

Image 1. Delphine Nephtalie Dauphin, 10, shows her cupcakes in her home kitchen on July 20, 2019. Dauphine has owned her own
cupcake business, Joy's Yummy Cupcakes, for three years. She's catered parties and weddings and sells hundreds of cupcakes on
weekends. Photo by: Al Diaz/Miami Herald/TNS

Delphine Dauphine, age 10, begged her mom since she was 4 years old to let her start her own
business. By age 7, her mom relented. So she started her own cupcake business.

Taylor Moxey, age 13, just wanted new dolls when she was 7 years old. But her parents wanted her
to learn the value of money management. To buy her own dolls and accessories, she had to make
her own money. So, she, too, started her cupcake business at age 7.

Delphine's business is called Joy's Yummy Cupcakes. It now sells 200 cupcakes on the weekends
and caters birthday parties and weddings. Taylor has since branched out from her business called
Taylor the Chef. She speaks at conferences. She gave a Ted Talk. She has also established a
foundation to build libraries around the world.

The Youth Economic Development Conference, or YEDC, is a conference about jobs for young
people. The meeting takes place in Miami, Florida, at Miami Dade College. It is called MDC for

This article is available at 5 reading levels at https://newsela.com.

short. Five hundred kids attended the meeting. They
learned how to start their own businesses and become
youth entrepreneurs.

"It's never too early to learn," said Saliha Nelson. She

is the founder and head of the conference. She is also
vice president of Urgent, Inc. It is a Miami-based
organization that empowers youth to impact their
communities in positive ways.

For the past six years, hundreds of teens and college

students across Miami-Dade County between 14 and
21 have attended the two-day conference. They've learned about business, entrepreneurship and
the arts and entertainment industry. They also connected with local businesses and professionals
in those fields. Every year, attendees can participate in hands-on financial literacy, professional
development and career exploration workshops, business vendor fairs and youth film festivals.

In past years, YEDC was a two-day event at MDC's North Campus. The event attracted mostly
youth from the Overtown, Liberty City and Little Haiti neighborhoods. Daniella Levine Cava is a
Miami-Dade commissioner, or local official. She represents South Miami-Dade County. She
helped organizers add a one-day conference at MDC's Homestead Campus.

At this year's conferences, attendees learned how to boost their resumes on LinkedIn. They
learned how to tap into the tourist and theatrical industries. They learned to develop coding skills
and how to become a kid entrepreneur, among other sessions. North Campus' conference
culminated in a business pitch competition in which Taylor was a judge.

The winners, twins Sandra and Sarena Noel, pitched Noelle's Gardens, a service that helps people
plant and maintain gardens in their backyards for a fee. Jean Monestime, a Miami-Dade
commissioner, and the Dade Federal Credit Union were impressed by their business acumen.

"We're putting young people in front of these folks who they couldn't get to by themselves," Nelson
said.

Taylor, whose foundation has built libraries in the Bahamas and Palm Beach and plans to build
more in Mexico, El Salvador, Colombia and Haiti, wants people young and old to know that their
age doesn't stop their potential.

"If you really have a passion for something, go out and make it happen," she said. "Those who say
they can and those who say they can't are both usually right."

This article is available at 5 reading levels at https://newsela.com.