On Thursday, Feb. 26, the Cleveland Leadership Center will host its 12^th Accelerate pitch competition. With 35 presenters pitching 26 unique and innovative ideas, the FreshWater Cleveland staff decided to talk to just a few select entrepreneurs about their visions to make Cleveland a better place to live, work, play, and visit in hopes of winning funding and making invaluable connections to bring their ideas to life. Today, we talk to Ban Colas about his vision for Stronger Together.

Benjamin Colas has a vision that could transform Saturday mornings across Cleveland: families putting down their phones and iPads and sweating together—bonding through burpees and building relationships while building strength.

The seasoned educator will pitch his idea at the Cleveland Leadership Center's Accelerate: Citizens Make Change competition on Thursday, Feb. 26 at Huntington Convention Center.
Teacher and entrepreneur Ben Colas.His concept, called Stronger Together, will bring free parent-child workout classes to local parks, creating screen-free opportunities for families to connect through fitness. Activities like bear crawls and crab walks are designed to be fun for kids while also physically challenging the parents.

Colas, who is founder and director of Forest City Academy in Cleveland Heights, says the Stronger Together classes foster bonding, healthy habits, and social connection.

"The idea is to essentially offer parent-child workout classes," Colas explains. "[We’re] giving parents and kids something to do together, promoting bonding by doing something screen-free—something physically challenging but also done in a kid friendly way that's not too tough for parents or for the kids."

The Stronger Together routine is centered around real-life experiences Colas has observed as a parent and educator. With a five-year-old, three-year-old, and a baby coming in May, he says he understands the challenges parents face in finding activities that both parents and kids enjoy.

"As a parent, I know that parenting, at times, can feel isolating, time is at a premium, and, frankly, places like Chuck E. Cheese are a miserable experience for the adults,” he observes, “versus something that is both enjoyable for kids and parents that they can do together."

Eye on the prize
Colas brings unique credentials to his proposed venture. As an educator, he is experienced working with young children. "I used to teach kindergarten," he says, adding that the same experience is what led him to open his school last fall.

Ben Colas will pitch Stronger Together, an outdoor, free family exercise program, at 2026 Accelerate.The business model for Stronger Together is intentionally simple and scalable, Colas says, adding that he envisions holding classes at locations like Edgewater Park or Public Square as logical starting points.

As those initial classes take off and grow, he says, he plans to expand to pop-up classes all over Greater Cleveland.

The approach draws inspiration from F3, a national men’s fitness organization that offers free peer-led workouts, but with a crucial difference: "It would be much more focused on like parent-child bonding through a physical activity,” Colas promises.

After Colas pitches Stronger Together at the Accelerate competition, he hopes to secure seed funding and community connections to launch the business.

"Obviously, money," he jokes, when asked about his goals for Accelerate. "But the idea that what I have is pretty low overhead, and [funding is] the type of thing that could be the catalyst to get this off the ground."

The funding would support basic equipment and initial marketing efforts, including raising awareness for the workouts, and perhaps hosting raffles and food at the end of sessions to provide some incentive to come.

Beyond the financial support, Colas says he sees Accelerate as an opportunity to build community partnerships. "I don't know what it would look like,” he says. “I’m just thinking of local champions in a particular neighborhood who could say, ‘here's a great park to have it,’ or ‘this church says our parking lot's available if you want to do the workout in the parking lot.’"

Third go-round
This isn't Colas's first time at Accelerate. In 2016, he pitched his idea KinderKits, a kindergarten readiness kits designed to help parents use everyday household items as teaching tools.

He won Accelerate 2016 in the Educating for Tomorrow category.

Then, in 2022, Colas again returned to Accelerate with his latest entrepreneurial idea—Ascend, which is a benefit employers could offer to their employees to help them thrive as parents.

Those business pitch experiences taught him the value of Accelerate's low-barrier approach to innovation.

"What a cool opportunity if you have an idea—you don't need to have the proof of concept yet," he points out. "It's very low risk with the potential from the financial side [and] the networking, the connections, introductions, have tremendous value."

Benjamin Colas' winning 2016 Accelerate idea for KinderKits, kindergarten readiness kits.An education-focused path
Colas took a rather non-traditional path into teaching. He began his training with Teach for America Corps, where he taught in charter schools and public school systems. He then earned an MBA from The Ohio State University and completed a principal residency at Cleveland Heights-University Heights City School District.

He says his teaching and education experiences have given him a broad perspective on what families and students need.

Colas’ educational philosophy extends beyond traditional academics to a bigger picture. "We want to do more than have book smart, academically prepared kids,” he says. “We want them to grow up to be confident, independent, resilient. And that's where I think the idea of doing physical challenges and being healthy can play just a key role."

"I enjoy exercising, but both getting to the gym or fitness classes are typically expensive, and there’s the time factor as well," he argues. "Stronger Together solves the quantity and quality time you want with your own kids, while being active and engaging."

Colas says winning Accelerate could help Stronger Together offer Cleveland families something that is increasingly rare: An affordable, accessible way to prioritize both physical health and family connection. As Colas prepares for his pitch, he's betting that other parents share his vision of Saturday mornings filled with laughter, movement, and meaningful time together—no screens required.