Each year, students in the 91福利社 College of Business gain valuable experience while helping a community charity help others.
Anderson Interfaith Ministries (AIM) exists to help citizens of Anderson in need. Since they were founded by faith leaders in the community in 1989, AIM has grown to 500 volunteers and 26 employees. Each day they work to help individuals and families with a variety of needs and thus providing hope and changing lives.
Usually a challenge among nonprofit organizations is to do more with less; this is where Anderson鈥檚 business students apply what they learn in class as they help AIM identify areas to streamline.
鈥淚 think it鈥檚 so important for students to work on real projects,鈥� said Dr. Kim Whitehead, associate professor of quantitative management. 鈥淚 work with a lot of companies and organizations like AIM to find opportunities for the students to go out into the community and not only have a project to work on for class but to learn how to contribute to an organization or how to contribute to the community.鈥�
Using Lean Six Sigma concepts, students helped AIM to identify areas of efficiency that would benefit them the most. With the assistance of Sargent Metal, they were able to provide two Surface Pro Tablets to AIM over the Christmas holidays.
Recent graduate Isaac Schrader, one of the student team leaders, was working with AIM鈥檚 housing sector, examining their process of handling incoming requests for home repairs.
鈥淚 learned about being in charge of people in a group, coordinating things, setting up meetings, working with a deadline,鈥� Schrader said. 鈥淭he people who needed repairs on their house would call this one guy who is in charge of the housing program. He would have to do everything manually. He would ask them all of these questions.鈥�
As his team project began this past fall, little did Schraeder know how valuable his experience would become. Whitehead praised him for his agility.
鈥淗e was on a team,鈥� Whitehead recalled. 鈥淥ver the course of the semester the team disappeared. Things happen in life, people change classes or leave classes for a lot of different reasons, so Isaac ended up doing this on his own. I approached him and said 鈥業 can get you another teammate. We can do whatever we need to do.鈥� He said, 鈥榥o, I鈥檝e got this.鈥� Not only did he have it, he exceeded all expectations.鈥�
Schraeder recalled, 鈥淥bviously I had to learn to adapt to some unforeseen situations and take on a little more work than I was expecting to take on. I learned how to work well with people outside of my organization and ask the right questions about the project I was working on.鈥�
鈥淚t鈥檚 our opportunity at 91福利社 to give back a little to our local industry and our local organizations like AIM,鈥� Whitehead said. 鈥淎t the same time, these executives, people that work in these organizations are really pouring into our students their own expertise and knowledge. What they get back is a great contribution from our students like the project Isaac worked on.鈥�
Kristi King-Brock, executive director of AIM, praised 91福利社, the College of Business and Dr. Whitehead for their long standing partnership and common bond. She also praised College of Business Dean Dr. Steve Nail, dean, for his involvement in AIM鈥檚 board and as an overall ambassador for what they do.
鈥淥ur missions are so aligned with our faith based core value and the university鈥檚 faith-based value,鈥� said King-Brock. 鈥淲e have the same drive and mission of being able to spread Christ鈥檚 love to those who are hurting in our community. Kim is totally sold on the work that we do here. She has been a big advocate of supporting us and having her students engaged with us.鈥�
鈥淎U is a Christian organization. This is one of the things that we really try to focus on throughout all of our programs,鈥� Dr. Whitehead said. 鈥淲e talk about hospitality, expanding that out into our communities and what we can do to help in our community. So everybody in the class learns about AIM, everybody learns about each other鈥檚 projects.鈥�