By Ben Hall
noteworthy
Service learning has always been part of the Sawyer Business School experience. But over the past few years, teaching students how to develop greater civic knowledge and the skills they can use to address real, community-identified needs has become central to the Sawyer curriculum. And it’s what students want: A 2021 survey from Deloitte found that Gen Z students want to work for companies that value purpose as well as profits. Demonstrating positive societal impact is now part of the formal accreditation for business schools like Sawyer.
Toward that end, the University began offering a minor in nonprofit management in 2019. And in 2020, the Business School appointed Professor Sonia Alleyne, MPA ’01, executive in residence in the Business School’s Institute for Public Service. A past vice president for community reinvestment at the Santander Bank Foundation, she brings a wealth of experience (and a robust list of contacts) to the Business School, where she teaches courses like Social Change, Nonprofit Management, and Revenue Strategies for Nonprofits.
Q: Since coming to the Sawyer Business School in 2020, Dean Amy Zeng has made service learning a cornerstone of her vision. How do you see that playing out? Alleyne: My goal is that when nonprofits need help thinking through ideas, solving an issue, redoing their website—whatever it is—that they can come to the Sawyer Business School and work with our students. The value we bring is that we can partner with other disciplines, like marketing or data analytics. The aim is to offer a holistic, one-stop resource to any nonprofit organization.
Q: What’s the most important thing you try to teach students? I tell all my students that I’ve done my job if they leave my classroom more empathetic. That they see people and they’re not invisible. Like when they see a homeless person, they’ll now understand that every homeless person has a story—they came from a family, maybe a nuclear one like the students have—but something happened along the way that derailed their hopes and dreams.
Q: You not only teach students how to be empathetic, you also show them that working for a nonprofit can be a viable career option. We have more than 34,000 nonprofits in Massachusetts, so having our students exposed to that opens their eyes, and they see that their business skills are transferable. Even if, for example, they want to be an accountant, they can be an accountant for a nonprofit. Same with marketing or data analytics.
Q: What are some of the organizations you’ve helped Business School students work with over the past few years? Home Base, which helps veterans. InnerCity Weightlifting, a Boston-area gym that doubles as a job-training program for at-risk youth. Jewish Vocational Services. The City of Boston. Bridge Over Troubled Water, which serves homeless, runaway, and at-risk youth. That’s just a few of them.
Q: An impressive list! Sawyer’s focus on service learning is clearly an important part of the Suffolk experience these days. This generation has different expectations, right? They want to work for companies that reflect their inclusive values. Suffolk is a place where they can learn about the mechanics of that—and that they don’t have to wait until they graduate to be effective. They can start making an impact while they’re here. That’s very important.
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Professor Sonia Alleyne (center) with students Melissa Martins and Corrin Tangarone
Photograph by MIchael J. Clarke
| Fall 2022