Basic HTML Version
Page 3
Campus Review
May 14, 2012
College of Business Students
Are Helping Community Businesses
College of Business Partnership with
Fayette Chamber Continues with Partners in Education
Students in the College of Business at
Clayton State University have spent part
of the spring semester working with local
businesses on a variety of marketing-
related projects. In the proverbial win-win
situation, the Clayton State students get
real-life experience, and the businesses
benefit through volunteer expertise assist-
ing their marketing efforts.
Under the aegis of marketing professor
Dr. Beverly Wright, Clayton State stu-
dents have assisted numerous local busi-
ness, including; America’s Natural Gas
Alliance, Fayette Youth Protection
Agency, Lagniappe Cafe and NuLink
Communication.
Wright’s Marketing Principles class
recently worked with EdVenture Partners
to complete a marketing campaign project
for America’s Natural Gas Alliance
(www.anga.us). The students were
charged with developing, implementing,
measuring and presenting results for a
campus-wide marketing campaign with a
$3000 budget. The campaign included an
advertisement in the Clayton State student
newspaper, The Bent Tree, a Main Street
event and a movie night. Students gave
away prizes including a Wii, NetBook,
Notebook, and iPad.
Through the graduate-level Decision-
Making course that is a part of the MBA
program, Wright directs her student
groups to select a client from a list of non-
profit organizations and small businesses
as part of their research projects. The stu-
dents develop and conduct a focus group,
in-depth interviews, or a survey project
for their client over the course of the
semester. The final results, along with rec-
ommendations, are presented to the
clients and their constituents to help
clients improve their business efforts.
Recent clients include Fayette Youth
Protection Agency, Lagniappe Cafe and
NuLink Communication, just to name a
few. Businesses wishing to access
Clayton State MBA students’ expertise
can
contact
Wright
at
beverlywright@clayton.edu to register for
the program and become a client.
The AACSB-accredited College of
Business (COB) at Clayton State
University does far more in addition
to providing a first rate business edu-
cation to scholars in the south metro
area.
As Dean of Business Dr. Alphonso
Ogbuehi likes to point out, the
College of Business also specializes
in partnerships with its surrounding
community.
A good case in point is the partner-
ship with the Fayette County
Chamber of Commerce, a relation-
ship wherein the dean himself takes
an active role. Just last week, the
nature of COB’s partnership with the
Fayette Chamber was illustrated dur-
ing the Chamber’s annual Partners in
Education awards breakfast, a gather-
ing educators and business leaders
designed to celebrate outstanding
efforts by the business community to
help Fayette County public schools. A
joint effort of the Fayette Chamber and
the Fayette County Board of Education,
Partners in Education pairs the resources
of business with schools that can use
those resources.
Of course, no organization can give
awards without judges, and that’s where
COB took part. Ogbuehi and colleagues
Alisa Kirk, area director of the Small
Business Development Center (SBDC) at
Clayton State; and Heather Chaney, pro-
gram coordinator of SBDC, all served as
judges for the awards.
Our partnership with the Fayette Chamber
of Commerce has steadily continued to
gain strength through such programs as
Partners in Education,” notes Ogbuehi.
Among COB’s other roles in Fayette
County are the MBA program cohort at
the Clayton State – Fayette instructional
site in Peachtree City, and SBDC’s pres-
ence in Fayette County. Another recent
example of that presence was SBDC’s
popular “Starting a Business” work-
shop, a comprehensive workshop on
the important decisions that need to be
made prior to opening a business,
which was held at the Clayton State –
Fayette site, 100 World Dr., Ste. 100,
Peachtree City, on Mar. 22, 2012.