Global Recognition for a Maryland Smith ‘Pandemic Pivot’
MBA Roundtable Cites the Impact Consulting Fellowship Program as an Innovative Response to COVID
MBA Roundtable Cites the Impact Consulting Fellowship Program as an Innovative Response to COVID
Amidst a pandemic, the Center for Social Value Creation has created an unlikely source of commonality between universities: a guidebook.
Nima Farshchi is the Director of the Center for Social Value Creation (CSVC) at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland. Farshchi oversees the strategic direction of CSVC, focused on educating, engaging, and empowering Smith students to make a better world through business. Farshchi has a passion for how businesses can make the largest trickle-down effect on society through their practices.
Despite pandemic-induced social distancing, nearly 150 students are driving a Maryland Smith project this summer supporting value-driven organizations. With Zoom the primary platform, the Center for Social Value Creation at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business has launched a two-month Impact Consulting Fellowship program in the vein of its earlier, signature Change the World Consulting program. Under way as of June 2020, the Impact Consulting Fellowship involves full- and part-time MBAs managing undergrads and other master’s students in providing consulting services – for example, to the blended learning school College Park Academy, a blended learning school; Black Girl Ventures, which supports founders; MLevel, a digital learning development platform; and Great Dwellings, a D.C.-based company that helps homeowners maximize their Airbnb and short-term vacation rentals.