Students Advise Adult Ed Organization When Funding Decreases
A team of Babson undergraduate students working for the not-for-profit organization, Top Floor Learning, Inc., (TFL), has won the Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation entrepreneurship award of $2,500.
Team members Brian Deegan ’07, Brian Fox ’08, Jonathan Kardos ’07, Cheryl Morris ’08, and MBA Project Manager, Vinod Mohan, looked at all aspects of TFL’s operations to determine where they could make up $30,000 of lost annual funding, while continuing to offer their services. The analysis provided insight into the specific goals, methodologies, results, and recommendations of their GED/ESL, lifelong learning, and funding strategies.
TFL is an adult education organization providing English as a Second Language (ESL), General Education Development (GED), and lifelong learning services to the Palmer, Massachusetts, community.
The Second Place team supported Samaritans of Boston,whose goal was to increase program outreach. Members Manav Kapoor ’09, Jessica Kawilarang ’07, Harry Mranata ’09, Ardiana Natasha ’09, Fenny Tsai ’09, with MBA Project Manager, Nakul Munjal, won $2,000.
The Third Place team members Jimmy Greene ’08, Amit Nar ’07, Michael Perkins ’07, and MBA Project Manager, Daniel Walmsley M’07, helped The Clearing Ranch to build a financial model that would enable sustainability for the next 140 years. Third place earned them $900.
The Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation provided an endowment to Babson to encourage the application of entrepreneurship to nonprofit organizations. Cash awards go to the top undergraduate student teams that complete the most successful Management Consulting Field Experience (MCFE) or entrepreneurial field study project for a nonprofit business. This year the award is $3,500 to the first place team, and $1,500 for second place. The Management Consulting Field Experience (MCFE) links the business community with Babson College students through a management consulting team project. Each MCFE project is staffed by a team of three to five undergraduate students and one MBA project manager, with an objective to examine a real-life business situation. The assignments take place in a variety of business environments, which have included Fortune 500 companies, nonprofit, entrepreneurial ventures, and privately-held firms.
