Business
Profile: Farell Duclair – athlete, educator, entrepreneur and founder of the Everest Academy
Farell Duclair – athlete, educator, entrepreneur and founder of the Everest Academy
Former football star player in the Canadian Football League (CFL) Farrell Duclair is the founder of the Everest Academy – an institution that provides an excellent academic environment coupled with a strong focus on sports.
According to the school’s website, Everest students are fully engaged, empowered to excel in their own customized program, designed around what they love to do most. Whether it’s sports, information technology, music, arts or academics, Everest students are living proof of the expression ‘do what you love, love what you do.
Students at the school, work in a classroom setting from 8 a.m. to 12:35 p.m. In the afternoon, the focus shifts to athletics and sport.
Farrell Duclair follows in the tradition of many athletes-turned-entrepreneurs who have chased the same competitiveness and desire for success they found in the world of sports. He has also paired his vision with the more pragmatic sensibilities of a business-minded partner, a successful strategy pursued by many business owners before him.
One of the defining moments of Duclair’s life came during a football game in Montreal when he was 13. His team was playing for a championship, a point down, and it had a chance to win on a field goal. The kick sailed wide of the goalposts.
“I was crying my eyes out in the locker room. We worked so hard all season and we lost,” recalled Duclair. “But I picked myself up, dusted off and tried again. And the next year, we won.”
The lesson he learned from that game would stick with him throughout his career in football, one that took him to varsity teams at the University of Illinois and Concordia and ultimately landed him a spot in the Canadian Football League, where he won the Grey Cup with the Calgary Stampeders in 1998.
That same perseverance, hard work and addiction to the thrill of victory – and the ability to come back after defeat – came in handy with the founding and successful launch of the Everest Academy.
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