Happy Thanksgiving!

The application period for the Winter 2009 semester of the Founder Institute in Seattle closes 11/27 at midnight Pacific.  Come and apply to join some of the top founders in the country.

In the country?  Yes! In a recent VentureBeat post “Seattle has the most promising entrepreneurs.”

One of those entrepreneurs, Roy Leban wrote an in-depth blog post about being accepted into the Founder Institute and his decision to enroll. He shares his insights from the perspective of an experienced entrepreneur and technologist. A clip from the post reads:

“At first glance, I might not seem like the typical candidate for the Founder Institute. I’m not a fresh entrepreneur. I’ve been doing it a long time and I’ve had both favorable outcomes (sales) and failures (losing a lot of money). And I even serve as an advisor and mentor to a lot of other entrepreneurs. But, through it all, two things have remained constant: I’m an entrepreneur at heart, and I have a lot to learn.

And those two things are the key reasons that I’m excited that I just got accepted to be part of the Founder Institute’s winter session in Seattle.”

If you want to join Roy and jumpstart your startup apply to the Founder Institute by midnight on 11/27 at:  http://www.founderinstitute.com/apply/5

This just in: We’ve got a location now for our second info night–please join us on the Redmond Microsoft campus for a look at what the Founder Institute is bringing to Seattle and how you can participate and benefit! Come learn about the curriculum, resources, mentors, and more, get your burning questions answered, and get to know your fellow founders!

Registration for tonight’s free event is here: http://seattle-fi2.eventbrite.com/ We’re looking forward to seeing everyone there!

We have added a video of the comments made by graduating Founders of the Bay Area semester that was recorded by the San Diego chapter of the Founder Institute, FoundersList.  You can find it on our Video page here.

Also, I was interviewed by Michael Surkan of Entrepreneurs Northwest and that podcast can be found here.

Finally, Adeo Ressi, creator of the Founder Institute wrote a good post on Why Apply to the Founder Institute.

To avoid any confusion, since the Early Admissions deadline for TheFunded Founder Institute semesters in the Bay Area and New York is midnight on Sunday, November 15th, 2009, we are extending the Seattle semester Early Admission deadline to the same time, midnight Pacific on 11/15/09. 

If you can benefit from training and mentorship to make your startup more successful, please apply. If you know a founder that needs help, encourage them to join the program. The Institute is run by founders for founders, providing a framework for successful entrepreneurs to share their experiences and to help.

There are a three benefits to applying before midnight on Sunday. First, early admission applicants have two separate chances to be accepted, since the application will be reviewed on this Monday and then again after the final admissions date. Second, the acceptance rate of early admission applicants has historically been just over 50%, versus lower rates in the final admissions deadline. Third, accepted founders from early admissions have more time to enroll, to get set-up, and to review the courses.

– Apply here for Seattle

Completing an application takes under an hour. Good luck, and Enjoy!

I thought Guy Kawasaki’s Get Up and Get Going! talk would be an appropriate first content posting as FounderWise gets up and gets going!

Enjoy…