After nine months, countless hours and a lot of board meetings, the 15 graduate students of the Scholars Onboard Program are finally done.
The program, funded by a $45,000 grant from Pacific Continental Bank, allowed students to participate on governing boards of regional nonprofit organizations from September 2005 to May 2006.
Students, instructors, donors and organization representatives met Tuesday during the Board Governance Symposium to distribute certificates of acknowledgment to participants and celebrate and analyze the year’s work.
Renee Irvin, director of the University’s Not-for-Profit Management Program, said the Onboard program helped the University offer a more complete education to students interested in pursuing nonprofit-related careers.
“We have a really well-developed nonprofit management curriculum,” she said. “What we were missing was that piece: how to work with nonprofit boards. That is so central to the nonprofit sector.”
Throughout the symposium’s many student speeches, the opportunity to work with real-world organizations was championed as the program’s best aspect.
“What I think I really gained from the experience was the perspective from the board,” said Jennifer Zeier, a graduate student who worked with the women’s advocacy group Ophelia’s Place.
“In class, we learn about how to be a manager at a nonprofit … and then all the sudden I was on the other side,” she said. “I think that that perspective just opened my mind.”
April Snell, another graduate student who worked with the sustainability recycling group BRING
Recycling, said participating with governing boards brought textbook concepts out of the classroom and into the world.
“I had the wonderful opportunity of seeing an organization going through a very large capital campaign, which is something that, yes, I’ve read about, but the experience of participating in has been beyond description,” she said.
Students of the program attended a one-credit course titled “Nonprofit Board Governance” in addition to their duties on boards. The course met three times.
Diane Lang instructed the class and echoed students’ praise of the professional opportunities the program provided.
“This is really the best where we combine academics, research and knowledge, and then place (students) in organizations where they can see that passion and hard work overcome a lot of obstacles,” Lang said.
Many of the involved organizations’ representatives thought the program helped their cause as well as contributed to the ideals of nonprofit business.
“It’s been a wonderful experience,” said Julie Daniel of BRING Recycling. She said she believes the students educated in this program “will have the opportunity to change the world because nonprofit really are at the forefront of social change.”
Boards also gained a valuable member who was familiar with best practices because of the program, Irvin said.
Best practices involve clearly understanding the roles and responsibilities of board members, she said. In addition, knowledge of legal duties, fiscal policy and the structure of a board were other key elements to best practices.
“(The organizations) got a dedicated, passionate board member who came in knowing what board service could mean,” Irvin said. “Even though this might be a student who didn’t have a lot of work or board service before, they knew what best practices were.”
Not all experiences were positive. Irvin mentioned a student who audited the course and said the student’s organization, which went unnamed, treated him like “an intern” rather than a productive member of their board.
Other students spoke of the challenges they had faced with hopes of improving the program in coming years.
Graduate student Dan Goldstein worked with the Mount Pisgah Arboretum and said group focus was an issue on his board.
“Instead of talking about strategic planning … they spend their time discussing which azaleas to plant outside,” he said. “I had a very positive experience … but hopefully next year this program can be strengthened.”
Pacific Continental’s grant will fund the program for another two years. A number of changes were proposed during the meeting.
The proposals included providing students with a letter of introduction with previous organization’s testimonials. This would help break the ice between the group and the student while persuading the group of the benefits of having a student on its board.
Another idea was to expand the program to include community members as well as graduate students.
If the group continued to be successful and be funded, Irvin said the program could become a formal institute, serving the approximately 400 nonprofit of Lane County.
Regardless of what future donors and organizations may think of the program, there was clear support from the symposium’s attendees to propel the program to new heights in coming years.
“It’s an awesome experience to see something go literally from the ground up,” said Snell. “The possibilities of what can be done here are amazing.”