College of Business Administration

GROUP MEMBERS:

Jason Schneider
Paul J Van Dyke
Claire Swinbank
Sarah Smith
Holly Mesta
David Scott

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

When we were asked to do a social change project this semester, the thought of helping the less fortunate kids of Pro Kids Golf Academy immediately sprung into the mind of Jason. Being a golf professional he was well aware of the needs of those kids down at Colina Park Golf Course in City Heights. Pro Kids Golf Academy & Learning Center is a not for profit organizations that gets kids off the streets and onto the fairways.

Pro Kids was founded in 1994 by Ernest H. Wright, Sr. “to provide a positive environment for the underprivileged youths with the emphasis on parents and families, teaching children to believe in themselves.” The goal was to let kids experience their dreams in a way that shows them that they can accomplish what ever they want. Helping kids is something that our group wanted to do.

Our group decided that we would run a charity golf tournament with all the proceeds benefiting Pro Kids Golf. We also were going to run a golf club drive hoping to help them with procurement of much needed clubs for their summer junior programs.

Mission Trails Golf Course was picked as the site and plans were arranged. Our group was able to get the tournament sponsorship form that Pro Kids uses for their golf tournaments. Group members Sarah, Claire, and Holly went soliciting for sponsorships, but to no avail. Paul and David passed out tournament entry forms as well as solicited golf courses for donations and clubs for the golf club drive. Jason contacted Mission Trials Golf Course, created the entry form, solicited donations, and acted as tournament chairperson.

The ethical frameworks that we used to support our reasoning for doing this social change project were social contract theory, deontology, justice theory and ethic of care.

Our agreement to work toward a common goal was based on the framework of the Social Contract Theory. We all accepted the rules of this project and we would mutually benefit from following these rules. Do onto others as they would do unto you was our deontological reasoning for helping these kids. Hopefully in the future they will repay our generosity to them onto the next generation of underprivileged kids. We care for the well being of these children and we want them to experience their dreams and maybe we provided them with a better chance to do that. We thought that the world needs some more distributive justice. The kids at Pro Kids Golf sometimes cannot achieve their goals. This is not necessarily their fault people are born into less fortunate circumstances and some goals need a little assistance to be achieved. Pro Kids Golf Academy tries to even the playing field by providing a place where the kids can use the tools they need but cannot afford. A $14 million dollar facility recently completed that has community classrooms, a computer lab, and state of the art golf training equipment. This facility was built solely on the private donations and is open to everyone after they receive an orientation.

Our goal was to raise over $2000 and 100 golf clubs for Pro Kids, but lack of interest in the tournament made us scramble for a last minute change that netted $355. We still collected over 100 golf clubs for the kids that will go toward their summer programs. We felt that a lack of time to set up the tournament and gather sponsorships was the reason the golf tournament was not as successful as we planned. But we succeeded in coming together and finding a way to raise some money for Pro Kids Golf Academy in the form of a closest to the pin competition. We used the donations we had received as prizes for the contest and all in all it went fairly well. We also came to the conclusion that a contest like this could be an ongoing thing. There could be one contest a month at a different course and in the course of a year, they could raise over $4000 toward their scholarship fund.

In summary, our group achieved a goal of raising funds and equipment for Pro Kids golf. We had a great time in the process at the competition and felt that the players had a very positive view of what we were doing. We had several comments at the event that showed appreciation for doing something to help a good cause. This is a great short term commitment that has a potential of raising funds for charitable organizations. The volunteers are showing their altruism by donating their time, and the players give a small amount that may benefit them in the end. Both of these factors equal a positive end result and our team members who were able to assist in the event feel very proud of being able to help. So in conclusion, we feel that our project was a success. We have a positive feeling for what we contributed, and the winners, which include the Pro Kids organization and the four contestants, are happy as well.