2025-26

This Winter quarter, Leonardo is interning with the Office of the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation (OASB) at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in Washington, D.C. The OASB advances interests of small businesses—from startups to small public companies and their investors—by identifying capital-raising issues and recommending policy changes to benefit small businesses, with a focus on challenges faced by women-owned, minority-owned, rural, and natural disaster area small businesses and their investors. 

His interest in this internship grew from his experience as a Jean Donovan Fellow, working with a Central Coast nonprofit organization last summer. He got to work alongside local farmers and food entrepreneurs in his community, where he learned firsthand how challenging it can be for these business to innovate and grow due to limited assets and inability to meet traditional loan requirements. This inspired Leonardo to learn more about how to address these challenges and sparked his interest in working with the OASB.

SEC's Scholars Business Program is an 8-week, in-person volunteer program. Before beginning the job, there was a lengthy vetting process involving extensive paperwork, national security clearance, privacy training, and more. He is staying with a family friend in Washington, D.C., taking the Metro to the office, and working around 30 hours per week while taking classes. Some of his assignments have included summarizing academic articles; contributing information useful to the annual report, a highly regarded collection of current and relevant information on small businesses; organizing data on spreadsheets; and attending advisory committee meetings—progressive conversations among CEOs, entrepreneurs, and small business advocates to determine carefully crafted policy recommendations. Leonardo shares: "It has been fascinating to witness the orderly process of collaboration among these knowledgeable individuals. Through research, calculations, and discussions, the committee gradually develops evidence-based policies to submit to Congress for consideration—hopefully resulting in improvements to capital raising." 

In his daily work, he has used wisdom from Leavey coursework, such as analytic skills and efficient use of Excel shortcuts and formulas from OMIS 15 and statistics; writing techniques honed in CTW; and leadership, communication, and empathy from MGMT 6, MGMT 71, and Ciocca Center's Mindset Scholars. Entrepreneurship and economics courses have helped him see from a business perspective and feel at home with terms like "dry powder" and "pre-seed funding." As the internship progresses, he hopes to continue to learn more about capital formation, barriers, and policy changes that could benefit small businesses and entrepreneurs like the ones he has become acquainted with on the Central Coast. 

"This fantastic opportunity would not have been possible without support and creative thinking from a number of SCU mentors, professors, and staff. Thank you to Chris Norris, Marcella Sorrentino, Brian Thomas, Meir Statman, Jocelyn Swendsen, Xuan Tan, Haibing Lu, Anisha Weber, and Brenda Versteeg—for supporting me in the process and helping make it happen."