Practice Makes Perfect: Impact and Use of Nonprofit Master Students’ Applied Projects on Nonprofit Organizations in the San Diego Region

Authors

  • Heather L. Carpenter
  • Paula Krist

Abstract

Recently, student learning outcomes and student satisfaction in nonprofit management graduate degree programs have received much attention from scholars. However, little research has examined the community impact of such programs. This paper reports findings from a community impact study of the Master of Arts in Nonprofit Leader-ship and Management at the University of San Diego. An extensive qualitative study was conducted to determine whether student-led applied projects conducted for non-profit organizations had an impact on those organizations and, if so, to assess the type and duration of that impact. Findings contain recommendations for future research and for future students engaging in projects. The future student recommendations range from improving communication between students and organizations to improving the timing and duration of the student projects. Nonprofit graduate pro-gram directors can use these results and recommendations when creating and managing the experiential learning components of their programs.

Issue

Section

Articles