SDSU Marketing Class Gains Real-World Experience and Makes an Impact in the Local Community

Women in Leadership x Women in Business team and panel after Lunch and Learn event.

During the fall semester of 2021, Steven Osinski, marketing lecturer at the Fowler College of Business at San Diego State University, offered the students in his “Marketing and Sales for Social Impact” (MKTG 478) class a unique opportunity to gain real-world experience while also helping five worthy causes. Through this project, the class was able to make a significant impact in the lives of San Diego locals through six non-profit organizations, including Home Start, Humble Design, Make-A-Wish San Diego, Epilepsy Foundation of San Diego, and Women in Leadership. 

Osinski told the group that this class would be “a blank canvas. To make this class work, I really need all of you to make it happen,” he said. “I have a bunch of intelligent, conscientious students, and there are some real places in this community that could benefit from our help. Either we’re going to succeed together or fail together, but the ball is in all of your courts.” 

With $40,000 of privately donated money divided among the six organizations, the students split into teams and began partnering with the staff members of each non-profit to assess their marketing and fundraising needs. “The money was donated to the non-profits to ensure that our students would have the opportunity to use their business skills in a real-world environment with the ability to allocate actual dollars towards their clients’ fundraising efforts by purchasing digital media, creating ads and through other promotional efforts,” said Osinski.

Humble Design team at their home deco day.

Creating Lifelong Moments with Humble Design

Conrad Holden chose to work with Humble Design because “they offered a hands-on experience to dive deep into their mission and actually furnish houses for individuals leaving homelessness forever. While also being able to apply marketing aspects in design, social media, and video production.” 

The group of students led by Holden decided that the main goals of their project were to design support for houses, perform six Instagram takeovers, design donor books, and fund a deco day to decorate a home. With their dedication and determination, they were able to achieve those goals. During Humble Design’s deco day, the group partnered with the Home Start team to furnish a house for a family that recently fled Syria in one day!

Although the Humble Design group had many successes, they also faced challenges when collecting items for donation and producing an encompassing video to be presented to 3M corporation prior to the completion of the deco day.

Granting Make-A-Wish Miracles

Sophia Standen, the lead for the Make-A-Wish group, chose this specific organization because she was knowledgeable about their mission and “admired the smiles they are able to put on children’s faces.” 

Standen’s Make-A-Wish group’s main goal was to support their contact, Heather Ginsky, Corporate & Community Partnerships Manager, on any applicable projects. Some of these projects included working on corporate profiles for possible donors, editing interviews of Make-A-Wish children, and re-designing Make-A-Wish’s fundraising packet to be more aesthetically pleasing and fun to read. 

During the project, the Make-A-Wish team organized a Wish Reveal party where the child received a camper trailer. The team helped with the prep work leading up to the reveal and most of the members were able to attend the wish to see the child’s priceless smile! 

Make-A-Wish team after helping grant a child's wish of a camper.

Breaking Gender Barriers with WIB x WIL

Lauren Williams, an executive member of the SDSU student organization, Women in Business (WIB), thought working with the Women in Leadership (WIL) conference would be a great opportunity to collaborate with an organization with similar values to those she already works with. 

The WIB x WIL team, led by Williams, hoped to grow awareness of the annual Women in Leadership Conference and highlight the discrepancies that still exist between male and female leaders in the workplace. Both organizations strive to empower women professionally and personally in order to set them up for future successes.

With the team's primary focus being events, there were challenges when narrowing down all the details of being in-person since the team had spent much of their time in college online and had not yet organized on-campus events before! Despite the difficulty of event planning, the WIB x WIL team successfully hosted the first “Lunch & Learn” by Women in Leadership project featuring two prominent women involved in the Sports industry. Approximately 90 students attended this inaugural event!

Leaving a Lasting Impact

Women in Leadership x Women in Business Career Panel.

Following the conclusion of the semester, the leads of each group reflected on their experience in the class, the importance of giving back, and their future career plans. “Although these nonprofits provide great support, the demand overwhelmingly exceeds what these organizations are capable of taking on at the moment. If every business took on a mission that was greater than profit, they would not only be lifting up the value of their business but also the lives of those surrounding them. Oftentimes much closer to home than you may have realized,” said Holden. 

With most of the students about to graduate, the class gave them valuable insight into looking for potential companies to work for. “I think the gathering of information for the corporate profiles definitely helped me a lot. For one, it taught me how to gather useful information about a company that can help me in job searches and make sure a company is right for me. It also helped me better understand the finances of businesses and what to look for when determining whether a business is suitable or not for financial donations,” said Standen.