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Inspiration Award
 ANNA
OUROUMIAN
President
Academy of Business Leadership
Some people fold under adversity. Others rise above it – they survive,
grow, and flourish. Anna Ouroumian not only survived early childhood as an orphan
in war-torn Beirut, but today she is a successful young woman who personifies
the American Dream.
When she came to Los Angeles alone, at the age of 17, Anna had $160 in her
pocket, barely spoke English, and had two books – a biography of Ronald
Reagan and a book on the Hard Business School. Above all, she was determined
to succeed.
In her senior year in 1994 at UCLA, she received the Chancellor’s Service
Award and was one of four out of 10,500 seniors to receive the UCLA Alumni Association’s
highest honor – the “Outstanding Senior Award” – for
her academic achievements, as well as service to UCLA and the community.
Anna is a trailblazer in the national community service movement. In 1993,
Anna was selected along with 1,500 young people to heed President Clinton’s
call to service inner-city youth across America as part of the pilot “Summer
of Service” program, the precursor to AmeriCorps. Later, she assumed various
leadership positions with AmeriCorps/Building Up Los Angeles. After two years
of service in AmeriCorps, Anna was selected as one of 15 fellows to serve on
the prestigious Governor’s Executive Fellowship Program in Sacramento.
Her appointment by Governor Wilson was with the State Attorney General’s
Office.
Through a college friend, Anna was introduced to the Academy of Business Leadership
and applied and secured the position of Executive Director. “I immediately
fell in love with the mission of ABL,” she says. “I felt I had what
it took to do the job. The position seemed perfect: it combined my love to empower
kids and my desire to work with corporate America to help open doors.”
ABL takes high potential low opportunity kids and exposes them to a world of
unlimited opportunities by teaching them entrepreneurship, leadership, and business
values at college campuses through the Summer Business Institute. Anna now serves
as the President and CEO of ABL. Anna has applied her dynamic, creative, strategic
and forward-thinking leadership style to catapult the organization in new directions.
Under her six-year tenure, the organization has tripled in size expanding to
their outreach to middle schools and Orange County; quintupled the number of
volunteers to over 500; and graduated over 1,400 students. The students come
from 240 high schools, 35 middle schools in 97 school districts from Los Angeles,
Orange, Riverside, San Diego and San Bernardino Counties.
She is involved with and serves on the boards of numerous community and nonprofit
organizations and has received awards and recognitions throughout her young
career.
Anna is exploring the possibility of taking the L.A. based ABL organizational
national, starting with a 25 student pilot program. She enthuses, “there
is a tremendous need for programs like ABL where certain young people would
normally fall through the cracks, and not have an opportunity to know their
options and thus realize their potential. Every kid deserves a chance, and we
have the responsibility to ensure that.”
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