On August 9, Ivey MBA students ventured outside their classroom to lend a helping hand to the London community.
Students participated in the annual Ivey Impact Day, where they spent the day at a variety of organizations around the city volunteering their time and business expertise. The event is organized and run by the Social Impact Club, with help from the MBA Program Office and the Building Sustainable Value Research Centre.
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“Impact Day gives students an opportunity to reconnect with life outside the MBA classroom,” Sandy Chen, a current MBA student and President of the Social Impact Club, said. “And students get to see that the decisions they make in their life and in their career have a direct and very quantifiable impact on society.”
Impact Day has two parts. First, students did some hands-on volunteering – some dug their heels in the mud by planting trees with ReForest London, others assembled food hampers at the London Food Bank, or put together marketing material at the Canadian Mental Health Association.
Second, the students put their heads together and helped local non-profits and social enterprises achieve sustainable growth through the social business design challenge. Students formed small teams to help examine a challenge faced by the organization and provided recommendations on improvement opportunities, performance metrics, and social impact assessments. Organizations involved include Verge Capital, Youth Opportunities Unlimited, and Meals on Wheels.
“A lot of the students want to continue engaging with the organizations after Impact Day,” Chen said. “The ongoing engagement is there. Overall, our class was inspired to embrace the theme of social responsibility into our future decision-making process.”
