Cedric Bobo

Just after Cedric Bobo launched Project Destined in 2016 as a social platform for students to receive training in real estate, he ran into former New York Yankees player Alex Rodriguez at a Jennifer Lopez concert. What happened next changed his life, as Rodriguez and Lopez partnered with him to seriously financially boost his program, as well as act as mentors to bring his teachings to inner-city youth, especially in the Bronx.

Over the past year, Project Destined, which offers internships and training in real estate, private equity and financial literacy, reached an alumni network of 30,000 students — a vast increase from the dozen or so Bobo started with a decade ago. The nonprofit also trained 10,000 new students in 2025.

Bobo attributed the program’s increase in membership to its new courses launched last year. Project Destined hired 10 new professors in 2025 to teach 10 classes focused on artificial intelligence and data science, with a goal to “remove some of the fear among our students around the impact of AI on their jobs,” Bobo said. BGO is providing the funding for those AI courses, which will teach 200 students across the U.S., Canada and Europe.

With Clark Construction, the nonprofit also launched four new programs solely based on skilled trades and construction management for both high school and college students focused on the office, residential and airport sectors.

Project Destined is also looking to build programs to help data center operators find talent, as younger people should be “exposed to the real estate and skills and training that are in demand,” Bobo said.

Plus, the nonprofit is working with CBRE on a new set of programs focused on practical applications of AI in real estate, as well as with Walker & Dunlop on real estate fundamental classes and law firm Hunton on a new course covering legal negotiation.

“My hope is that we’re giving students tools like sales skills, so they can actually have the ability to take some of the time and do things like business development, which is how you add tremendous value to whichever company you’re working for,” Bobo said.

In the year ahead, Bobo said the nonprofit is looking to launch a new set of classes for adults, starting with military veterans, as “there’s a lot of us out there who are trying to pick up new skills.”