Current Boston University School of Management student Kezia Koo (MBA '09) has been honored with the “What are you made of?” award, as well as a $13,000 scholarship, given jointly by Tag Heuer and Glamour magazine in recognition of women who use their lives to impact their community.
Koo will graduate from the School in May 2009 with concentrations in public & nonprofit management and international management.
Of the factors that contributed to her being honored, Koo explains:
“I spent the summer working on a Corporate Social Responsibility project for Starbucks in North Eastern India that was focusing on improving the lives of entrepreneurs who work in and around the tea estates from where Starbucks sources their teas.
"I had three main projects:
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First, I started a new social business called CHAI BDS for the local community to help the poultry farmers in that area. They will earn about Rs 4,000 per 45 days compared to their current salary of Rs 1500 per month.
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I built a financial analysis model that allows the office to monitor the financial health of all the small business they work with so they can coach the entrepreneurs more effectively and help them grow their businesses.
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Then I did a value chain analysis study for a local aromatic plant to determine if it was a worthwhile venture for both the local office and the entrepreneurs to get involved.
"I am currently writing a business plan for the new venture.
"I also started the first Black MBA group at Boston University. We currently have 15 members who are a mixture of 1st and 2nd year fulltime MBA students, as well as Professional Evening MBA students from both the Boston and Tyngsboro campus. We work on establishing a community here at BU for the Black MBA students as well as working closely with the admissions office to reach out to potentially new students.
"Finally, before BU, I raised money to help poor children in a small rural school in Belize. The kids didn’t have access to consistent meals so a team of us went down and built a kitchen for them using only manual labor."
Of how her experience at the School of Management helped support her in the work for which she has been honored, Koo says,
"I wouldn’t have been able to do any of the business development work that I completed this summer without doing my MBA degree. In particular, attending both the ITEC business plan and financial plan bootcamps were very helpful. I also used knowledge I gained in accounting, marketing, and economics on top of additional research from the World Bank.
"In addition, Professor Peter Russo [Director of Entrepreneurial Programs at ITEC] made himself available by email throughout the summer, since I hadn’t taken the starting new ventures class yet, and he was a tremendous resource."
Koo at the award ceremony, 6th from left
