By JONAS MILLER
Staff Writer
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St. Anne’s Institute has partnered with a Saint Rose MBA class in order to improve its current marketing strategies.
The College of Saint Rose sent out a request for proposals from the community earlier this year, in an effort to help non-profit organizations throughout the city. The College Advisory Board received a proposal from St. Anne’s Institute, a local school for girls located on Central Avenue, to help improve its current marketing strategies as it tries to spread the knowledge of the services it provides to the Capital Region.
The chair of the Advisory Board, Fred Boehrer, who is also the coordinator of academic service learning at Saint Rose, accepted the proposal from St. Anne’s.
Boehrer reached out to Savita Hanspal, a professor at the Huether School of Business at Saint Rose, and requested that her graduate-level class get involved in the project.
Hanspal’s class split into several groups, who were each instructed to come up with a marketing plan that they would then pitch to St. Anne’s.
Thursday evening, those pitches were made to the CEO of St. Anne’s, Anthony Cortese, who said afterward that the experience was incredible and almost overwhelming.
Hanspal’s students had 11 weeks to complete the pitch and prepare a full presentation within their groups to present to Cortese.
Cortese said the information he heard was going to positively impact the institute.
“Some things that we heard tonight, we can implement immediately,” Cortese said.
Among the topics brought up was creating both a stronger presence online and in the community through the use of social media and hardcopy advertisements.
“There’s a definite market out there, it just needs to be tapped,” said Reshmi Chakrabarti, a marketing student at the College.
Many of the groups touched on issues such as improving the appearance of the institute, and dedicating full-time positions to further the institute’s marketing.
St. Anne’s, located at 160 Central Ave., is a “not for profit organization dedicated to improving the emotional, mental and spiritual well-being of children and families throughout New York State,” according to its mission statement.
The institute provides services such as residential childcare for families in need, educational programs, and sexual abuse prevention programs.
Hanspal spoke to the nature of the assignment.
“As a teacher, I feel these types of projects are very challenging, but offer great learning opportunities to students,” said Hanspal.
Each group gave a 15-30 minute presentation, and the event wrapped up around 9 p.m.
Hanspal spent the bulk of her professional career in India. She has a doctorate in marketing, and has been teaching at Saint Rose for three years now.
“Through this kind of task, the students get real-life experience that no textbook or simulated exercise can provide,” Hanspal said.
She is proud of her students for accomplishing this task, and said they took the challenge head on, not allowing the deadline or the lack of information to affect their performance.
A current master’s student, David Newell, who earned his bachelor’s at SUNY Albany, appreciated the amount of professional experience gained from the presentations.
“I was a little nervous at first, because we weren’t sure who we were supposed to aim the marketing at,” Newell said. “Once we figured that out, we really got a grasp of the project.”
Newell said the presentation was very good practice for him professionally. Even though the students used Microsoft PowerPoint for their presentations, Newell said it’s a basic skill that you can never practice too much.
“Someday I could be making a major pitch, that could affect my entire career, and it’s the little things like how to make a successful PowerPoint presentation, that are going to help me succeed,” Newell said.
Cortese took careful notes during the presentations. He told the class afterward that he would study the information a little, and then commit, as the institute could instantly benefit from the ideas that were presented.
“When you see the same thing every day, you don’t realize what is working, and what isn’t,” Cortese said.
“The students provided great insight into how we can improve the institute that will help us find a balance between the things we’re doing well, and what needs to be improved,” added Cortese.
Overall, both Hanspal and Cortese were pleased with what the students presented.
“The students did a great job learning concepts, and then applying those concepts to a real- life situation,” Hanspal said.
