Impatience pushed top entrepreneur
Winnipeg Sun - Friday, May 12, 2000

Impatience is a virtue for Elaine Cowan, who last night was recognized by the Women Business Owners of Manitoba as Entrepeneur of the Year.

Five years ago, prompted by frustration, Cowan started Anokiiwin Training Institute, Manitoba's only aboriginal-owned and operated private vocational school.

If colleges didn't customize programs and bring them to the aboriginal committee, she would.

As a business, I have the freedom to move quickly, to make decisions based on what's happening with industry," Cowan says.

She started with one student, a 22-square-metre office, an old computer and a borrowed fax machine. Today she owns the building, employs 40 people and has had thousands of aboriginal students enrole, either on-reserve, at the St. Mary Avenue campus or in Thompson, where Anokiiwin has classrooms and a computer lab.

They've also gone into rural areas with mobile classrooms, built by students in their programs.

Today there's a demand for training in information technology, computers and administration, she says.

As a result, she's partnered with SHL Systemhouse, now GP Canada, to provide computer training, using their curriculum. In 1999, Cowan incorporated Anokiiwin Employment Solutions Inc., an employment agency.

The other recipients are: Merilee and Katherine Mollard, Triple M Ranch of Stonewall (start-up); Sandra Altner, The Management Exchange (contribution to the community); Maureen Kennedy, Eclectic Communications (home-based business) and Roswitha Scharf-Dessureault, The Tea Cozy (lifetime achievement).

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