Real Projects, Real Experiences, and Real Impact. What does that mean? The Goff Scholars and Goff Trailblazers courses focus on submerging students in real-life work environments. Students are tasked with real problems to solve for a company or organization. In solving the problem, students will form recommendations as to what the company or organization should do next. No two projects are exactly alike, and this year’s projects are fascinating.
Markie Hoggan is a senior at the University of Utah double majoring in finance and international studies. Currently, she is a student in Goff Trailblazers. Goff Trailblazers, instructed by Dr. Ruchi Watson, is a one-semester, multidisciplinary course that focuses on one project over the semester where students work with real businesses, nonprofits, and organizations. Hoggan says that this course has exceeded her expectations ever since she first heard about it from one of her business scholars’ professors, Bonita Austin and Goff Scholars instructor.
The current project client is Jill Stephenson, the Director of Student Services for the Center for Business, Health, and Prosperity at the University of Utah. One of their projects is Health 2 Go, a program based in Ghana that helps communities with basic health services. Their success in Ghana has motivated the program to look into expanding into Uganda. Hoggan and her classmates worked to see if this project would be feasible in Uganda, “My team is all drastically different in our interests and our majors,” Hoggan said, “Having that wide variety of backgrounds and majors helps us to choose what we want to focus on, and we are all willing to work on things that we are uncomfortable with.”
Finding that Health 2 Go could succeed in Uganda, Hoggan’s team will spend the rest of the semester crafting final recommendations for their project client, including considerations for the expansion process and funding opportunities. While a project of this scope can seem intimidating for some, the course support teams along the way to guarantee successful project outcomes and personal growth. Trailblazer classes are split into two different days: professional development and project days. Professional development days involve hand-picked guest speakers based on the class’s interests, and project days are for working in their teams on the class’s current project.
In Goff Scholars, Zuri Vasquez Bedolla is a senior that is pursuing a double major in Business Administration and Spanish. Goff Scholars is similar to Goff Trailblazers, but instead, is a two-semester course that completes two to three projects with real businesses and other organizations. Over this course period, Vasquez Bedolla says that Goff Scholars is helping her to build strengths in areas outside of her major and improve upon her current skill set.
One current Goff Scholars project is Intellireefs, a company with the unique technology to simulate and act as real coral reefs to help restore the coral reefs that have been in danger of extinction. The class is divided into three groups: the brand book, the website, and the strategy. Vaquez Bedolla’s team is working on the brand book. In the realm, her team is trying to find ways to enhance the overall brand by analyzing their current brand assets such as their website. She emphasized that every day there is something new and exciting to look forward to in class and that every day looks a little bit different.
“My favorite part of this course is definitely the people,” Vasquez Bedolla said, “The cohort is just so amazing. Even from our first project, I already feel as though I’ve made lifelong connections with people that I really love and enjoy being around.” The structure of the year-long course helps to facilitate these close relationships between students.
These courses are not just fiction or simply textbook examples. Goff partners with actual companies, nonprofits, and organizations. For most, these courses are the first introduction into the professional working world. The Goff Strategic Leadership Center believes that students can create and add value in any stage in life, especially now. Sign up for a course today, and discover the ways that you can add value. These are real projects and real experiences that help us to make a real impact.