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Partnership with the SD Padres In 2005, the San Diego Padres and San Diego State University's College of Business Administration partnered to launch the first Sports MBA program in the country partnered with a Major League Baseball franchise. Since that time, the Padres have co-hosted SDSU Sports MBA's annual commencement and case competition. In 2010, the Padres served as the subject of the case study in this annual event, with teams of MBA students from nine of the world’s top MBA programs analyzing several issues for the team’s executives and proposing their solutions. The judging panel featured Padres president and COO, Tom Garfinkel, EVP/general counsel, Katie Pothier, and SVP of branding, Laura Broderick. Executives within the team’s front office frequently serve as guest lecturers in the classroom, have overseen student projects related to front office activities, and provided professional career advice. The club has also hired two Sports MBA program alumni, Eitan Altman (SMBA ’06) and Verónica Nogueira (SMBA ’09). The most significant product of this partnership has been the SDSU Sports MBA program’s involvement with the Padres’ developmental facility in the Dominican Republic. For each of the past two years, Sports MBA students have taken classes in international business and international human resources on-site in the Dominican Republic as part of the annual class excursion to the island. Using their MBA curriculum to benefit budding entrepreneurs in the town adjacent to the Padres Dominican Baseball Academy was the focus of the Class of 2010’s trip to the D.R. The students raised over $5,000 to contribute to entrepreneurial ideas they developed alongside members of the surrounding community of Najayo, an impoverished beachside community with very little infrastructure or economic opportunity. The Class of 2011 took a different focus on their excursion, which took place from June 17-25, 2010. The course that this year’s class took abroad was International Human Resources, taught by SDSU College of Business Administration Associate Dean Dr. Gangaram Singh. The students were required to read Greg Grandin’s Fordlandia, and reflect on the impact of an American enterprise, in this case Major League Baseball, operating in a developing country. Students assessed the economic and cultural footprint created by baseball’s presence on the island, and explored ways that regulation, legislation, oversight, and intervention could mitigate some negative impacts of MLB’s presence. The group also proposed ways that baseball could have a positive impact on the people of the Dominican Republic, working with Sports MBA program alumna Verónica Nogueira (SMBA ’09), who was hired by the Padres to oversee community outreach in the area surrounding the team’s D.R. academy. The Sports MBA program looks forward to collaborating with other students and faculty at SDSU on this project, and working closely with our partners, the Padres, on these and other initiatives in the future.
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