Community groups reap benefits of MBA students' service projects

By Linda Myers

Local business startups and community nonprofits are among the immediate beneficiaries of this year's Park Leadership Service Projects at Cornell's Johnson Graduate School of Management.

This May 1 in Sage Hall, a group of students who are Park fellows at the Johnson School presented to community members and classmates the results of 12 yearlong volunteer projects they completed in 2001-02. They ranged from a plan to help community members with disabilities make and market their own goods and services (see related story), to a fund at a local credit union to help local businesses launch and expand, to a web-based way for community organizations to tap into the Johnson School's student consulting talent.

Sixty Park fellows a year receive free tuition and a stipend and, in turn, agree to undertake a significant project that will have lasting value in the community. The idea is to get budding business leaders to learn the habit, and value, of community service early on. The Ithaca-based Park Foundation underwrites the program

"These projects serve as an opportunity to practice business and leadership skills while making a difference in the lives of others in the community," said Clint Sidle, director of the Park Leadership Fellows Program at the Johnson School. "Past Park projects have had substantial impact in a wide variety of venues, including the direction of downtown Ithaca development, funding for the local United Way, programming for the Greater Ithaca Activities Center and the creation of the Big Red Venture Fund."

A list of this year's projects and the students who undertook them follows:

• The GO Fund -- Alternative Federal Credit Union: A venture-capital fund to aid local business start-ups and small business expansion, such as Turtle Creek Software, accounting and project management software for small construction firms. (Greg Hubbell and Jodi Glickman)

• Museum of the Earth Gift Shop -- Paleontological Research Institute: A marketing study for a gift shop in a new, nonprofit natural history museum, due to open in 2003. (Michael Johnson and Jake Ellerbrock)

• BizPal -- Challenge Industries Self-Employment Program: A business module to help people with disabilities involved in the agency's Supported Self-Employment Program start and run their own part-time small businesses; the program is supported by a Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation grant. (Tony Moon, Jeff Nordin, Scott Hazlett)

• Cornell University Business Incubator: Helps nurture Cornell and locally originated business ideas through the early stages by providing space and other needed resources; an outgrowth of the Johnson School's student-managed Big Red Venture Fund. (Brian Silver, Chia-lin Simmons)

• Johnson School Dean's Fellowship: A fellowship fund and recruiting program to attract more minority students to the Johnson School. (Zoe Werner, Alice Curry).

• JohnsonLife: A web resource on housing, shopping, dining and other key information about life on campus and in the greater Ithaca community for incoming MBA students. (Eric Motter, Moon Kim, Kendrick Ching).

• Johnson School Club $tart-Up: A summer camp on Cornell's campus to introduce 17- to 19-year-old women to aspects of business, entrepreneurship, leadership and financial independence and encourage them to consider pursuing an MBA degree. (Cory Murphy, Erin Edwards, Diane Fleck, Beth Watson)

• Johnson School Balanced Scorecard: A framework for measuring the operational performance of the Johnson School in terms of business processes, program innovation, customer satisfaction and the bottom line. (Gene Rendinon, John Cullom)

• Cornerstone Recovery Services Residential Facility (formerly Alpha House): An integrated marketing program to raise community awareness about the services of one of Tompkins County's chemical-dependency recovery programs. (Allison Babb)

• Cayuga Nature Center: A business plan to help a local nature center that has experienced significant financial deficits following a loss of state funding. (Jamie Durand, Ken Christensen, Mark Seris)

• Tompkins County CFO Corps: A web-based tool to link local non-profits and small businesses with student business consultants. (Kerry Dolan, Tim Klusas, Damon Thornburg)

• Entrepreneur Network -- Cornell Entrepreneurship and Personal Enterprise (EPE) Program: A local, regional and global Cornell alumni entrepreneurs network to promote entrepreneurship through Cornell's EPE program. (Greg Hubbell)

For more information, contact Clint Sidle at 255-4104 or ccs7@cornell.edu , or visit this web site: http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/park/service.html.