Ava Gutierrez of the 2026 joins the Altman Program with real world business experience under her belt. She participated in Heights Business INCubator, a program at her high school in which students create a business from scratch. 

She answered some questions about her experience:

What is the program? How did you become involved?
The INCubator course is offered to juniors and seniors and places the enrolled students into groups of 3-5 based on a self-evaluation of your strengths and weaknesses. It is then tasked to all the groups to find a problem and then form a business that focuses on a solution. Through the year real world entrepreneurs and business experts serve as coaches guiding student teams through the process of ideation, market research, and business plan development. The year is dedicated to preparation for Pitch Night, a community event where teams have the opportunity to pitch in front of a panel of judges and an auditorium full of spectators to win up to $10,000 in funding.  

I joined the course as a junior and my team started Clean Break, the most affordable pick-up delivery laundry service for college students and young adults. My three team members and myself built the business from the ground up from coding a website to going to the laundromat and doing the laundry ourselves. For about three months we were a functional operation with customers and profits, but by the end of the school year we dissolved as a company after we decided as a team our priorities for the next year to come were in other places besides our business. All worked out for the best when I was hired to the 2021 Pitch Night grand prize-winning team, FYDER LLC., as the chief operations officer (COO). At FYDER, we believe that technological innovation and environmental preservations efforts should go hand-in-hand. Our primary effort is to divert the polypropylene bulk bag waste stream created by manufacturers from the nation’s landfills and water sources. We do this by converting the bulk bags into 100% recycled 3D printer filament. I joined the team in the fall of 2021 and will be continuing with FYDER into college. 

What made you want to participate?
As a freshman in high school, there was always a buzz around the INCubator program. The program was brand new, the classroom was updated with big screens and fancy desks, and when you saw students in blazers and pencil skirts “dressed for success”, you knew something was going down in the INCubator class. I was intrigued by the unconventional style of learning, where you are taught by local experts who live and breathe business. I have always had a knack for public speaking and presenting ever since I was a kid, so I was excited to learn from a business lens and practice daily.

What were some of the activities you participated in?
With the program, we were lucky enough to visit Geekdom, a collaborative coworking space for start-ups in the heart of the technology district in San Antonio, Texas. It was great being able to meet with other entrepreneurs and see what start-up culture is like outside of a high school class. Prior to my joining with the team, FYDER won the Pitch Night Grand Prize ($10,000), Pitch Night People’s Choice ($1,000), and the National INCubatoredu Pitch ($10,000), totaling $21,000 in funding within the first year. Since I have joined the team, we have won two more pitch competitions, the Texas A&M Highschool Ideas Challenge, and the T-Mobile Changemakers competition. From those completions we received more than $7,000 in funding. The momentum and exposure from pitches have opened many doors for FYDER and we have gladly walked through. With my team, we traveled to Houston, Texas to visits Re3D. Spun out of a NASA engineering program, Re3D is a social enterprise creating new innovations to minimize the cost and scale barriers to 3D printing. We met with one of the founders, Samantha Snabes, and discussed her experience in the start-up and recycling community along with talking through some of the problems we were having in our business. A little closer to home, we toured San Antonio Waste Management to better understand why recycling is such a strenuous process on a mass, city wide scale. Hard hats and reflective vests on, we saw first-hand the mechanical issues with sorting plastics, glass, and other recyclable materials. Texas’ largest grocery store chain, H.E.B., hosted us at their recycling plant in San Antonio, where we toured the facilities and met with true recycling aficionados. They shared their expertise and two cents on the gradual improvements in recycling and the setbacks that prevent sustainable impact from the efforts. It has been a privilege to be able to experience and learn from those who have been in the industry for many years. Joining FYDER has been one of the most exciting and new opportunities for me within my high school career. There is so much to come from FYDER in the future. 

What have you learned from your experience?
Oh boy, there is so much I have learned it’s unbelievable. From a general business sense, I have shifted my perspective from being strictly a consumer to now being on the business owner end of the lens. There is so much logic and strategy in business, but there is also a creative side that is just as important and influential. There is so much opportunity in the word “business” that I had not been exposed to prior to taking the course. I would have to say that the most important lesson I learned was to ask for help. I have a reluctant personality where I would rather pull out my hair and stress to get the work done by myself rather then ask for help or advice. I have realized now that my previous mindset is NOT sustainable. All you need sometimes is someone else’s eyes to look at your issue and to see something that you didn’t. My teammates at FYDER, 3 brilliant young women, have really showed me what having trust in one another looks like and the power in fluid and cohesive unity. I have so much to learn still and a lot of room to grow, but I am grateful for the experiences and knowledge I have gained so far and I’m beyond excited for my future in the Altman Program.

You can find out more about FYDER on their website: https://fyderfilament.com/ Follow them on Instagram: @Fyder_filament