Senior Joshua Calderon, whose team won the spring 2016 Abington business competition, said it was a thrilling experience.
"It allowed us to envision a good marketing plan under real conditions and develop it from all aspects," he said.
Janie Saile, a senior student athlete, liked the close-to-real-world-conditions, which included working with people from other backgrounds.
"We had the opportunity to work on a specific idea on short time frame plus learning to work through any communication barriers with the German students," she said.
Calore, coordinator for Academic and Community Engagement and associate professor of philosophy, at Abington, praised the results.
"The teams all put their 'A' games together and didn’t hold anything back,” he said. "We have three universities and one company with different cultures and great diversity that worked together beautifully. Inclusion, diversity, and excellence were all on display."
Calore served as a faculty coach along with Dan Goldberg, lecturer in business at Abington; Maximillian Walter, professor of economics at Hof University; and Janine Black, management coordinator and assistant professor of management at Kean University.
What makes the Penn State Abington International Business Competition unique?
The organizers flip the typical business competition format in favor of a design that provides an international component while replicating the business environment:
- Faculty coaches intermingle German and American students on each team so they encounter varied experiences, cultures, and languages.
- The students perform original research, making site visits to gather information instead of working from a case study.
- The students must surmount cultural and communication hurdles within their teams en route to solving a challenge posed by the sponsoring company. The sponsor also provides a team of executives to volunteer as mentors throughout the process.
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Penn State Abington, formerly the Ogontz campus, offers baccalaureate degrees in 18 majors at its suburban location just north of Philadelphia. Nearly half of our 4,000 students complete all four years at Abington, with opportunities in undergraduate research, the Schreyer honors program, NCAA Division III athletics, and more. The Lion’s Gate residence hall will open in August 2017.