Impact Challenge – An Innovative Nova SBE Fellowship for Excellence Initiative
Happened at Nova | 21 January 2018 Impact Challenge – An Innovative Nova SBE Fellowship for Excellence Initiative

Last November 19th, Nova SBE’s Fellowship for Excellence students participated in an social impact initiative in partnership with Everis, a renowned multinational business and data company that is also the partner of this scholarship program at Nova School of Business & Economics, the Municipality of Cascais and the Community Center Parish of Carcavelos [Centro Comunitário Paróquia de Carcavelos – CCPC] to work on sustainability and social responsibility issues. The social impact challenge, also known as “Impact Challenge”, intends to help students develop the technical skills they will need for the job market while aiming to help CCPC. 

The students were, thus, challenged to find solutions for CCPC – a community center that takes in children, families, and the elderly, assisting in numerous social and employability areas – by asking the students how they could guarantee CCPC’s financial sustainability for the next years. The goal is to try to solve the community center’s most pressing issues while assuring that it will still have the capacity to provide its social services.

This initiative began at 10:00 a.m. and took place at CCPC, where several CCPC representatives welcomed the students and talked them through the center’s situation. After that, both Everis and Nova SBE representatives contributed to the challenge by combining the knowledge they have on consulting, social service, and fundraising issues. Once divided into teams, students came up with the best ideas and pitched them to a jury composed of members of the community center itself and Everis. For a five-month period, students will work side by side with Everis consultants to implement the most impactful project for the community center.

This is an innovative initiative that intends to emphasize the interest, the motivation, and the involvement that these students already have with social causes – which is why, aside from their academic excellence, they were appointed as Nova SBE Fellows – while preparing them for the upcoming job market and motivating them for a sustainable professional development, considering impact and social responsibility. Bellow, you can have a glimpse of this innovative challenge.

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