Community service is an important part of the Naveen Jindal School of Management’s curriculum. All incoming freshmen and new transfer students are required to fulfill 100 hours of community service or work on business-related projects for nonprofits in order to graduate. The purpose is to instill professionalism, cultural competency, and social responsibility in students while they serve the community.

The Jindal School’s Social Sector Entrepreneurship and Community Engagement (ENTP 4340) course, taught by Robert Wright, an assistant professor of practice in the Organizations, Strategy and International Management Area at the Jindal School, allows students to fulfill all 100 required hours in one semester. That is a definite advantage, but the program also provides even more profound benefits

The Program places groups of students with various nonprofit organizations to serve as consultants. They assist the groups in addressing their specific issues. This past fall there were 170 JSOM students enrolled in the course. They formed 31 teams of four to six people each. The projects are sourced through the United Way of Metropolitan Dallas.

“These are real-world clients with real-world projects and they have serious expectations,” said MaryBeth Fickel, social entrepreneurship program manager. “We work with the student teams on those difficult but necessary things like managing client relationships.”

Literacy Achieves, a Dallas-based nonprofit that provides English classes and literacy programs for non-English speaking adults and their children, is currently working with two teams of students who provide consulting services.

“One team is looking at (ways to create) a revenue stream for us,” said Dionne Kirby, CEO. “The other is looking at getting the word out about our program. To be able to have consultants work on this for us — that’s big. They are helping us with problems that we would not be able to solve on our own.”

I’ve enjoyed having the benefit of their time, energy, and effort in this unique time in their liveswhen they are learning – Dionne Kirb

After working with the students and seeing what they have been able to accomplish, Kirby recognizes the value of the program.

“I’ve enjoyed having the benefit of their time, energy, and effort in this unique time in their lives when they are learning,” she said. “They are taking a plan into their hands, inviting it into their brain, and making it grow. They find holes in the plan and ask the questions they need to ask so that they can do a better job. It’s almost like sitting with directors in a room while we’re solving a problem.”

Kirby added that she hopes this is the beginning of a strong relationship between Literacy Achieves and UT Dallas.

For Edward Mendoza, a senior finance student at JSOM who is part of the social entrepreneurship program, the early days of his volunteer project were frustrating, but eventually, things fell into place. He said working with Esposure4All, which serves the community using esports as an education, training and scholarship tool, was good training for his future career

“In the beginning, there was a lot going on,” he said. “But we decided to start taking things one step at a time and focusing on the most important thing.”

The team focused on creating a donor pitch deck to help spread the word about Esposure4All, which brings opportunities to underserved communities by providing resources and education through e-sports.

“It was good to have the support of the professors,” Mendoza said. “Once we got the first contact with our organization and Brittney Seals, the chief operating officer, they were also helpful in referring me to other professors who could help. We got the contacts we needed and started talking to people about Esposure4All. Now we’re in a good place.”