PHINMA Education chosen as project partner for Harvard Business School

PHINMA St. Jude College Manila recently hosted a team of students from Harvard Business School in its campus in Sampaloc, Manila for one week as part of a required course called the FIELD Global Capstone.

PHINMA Education was one of 156 FIELD Global Capstone Project Partners spanning 14 cities across 14 countries. Together these Partners combined to host more than 900 Harvard Business School students in all.

“Our mission to serve the underserved has always guided our work and continues to shape how we design college education for our learners. It challenges us to continually rethink how we teach with the realities of poverty in mind,” said PHINMA Education Chief Operating Officer Liezl Occiano-delos Angeles.

“This work allows Harvard Business School students to engage in learning experiences grounded in this context, surfacing insights into the lived experiences of underserved communities that most textbooks and classroom discussions do not fully capture.”

The FIELD Global Capstone is a course designed to strengthen and develop students’ ability to manage and operate effectively in a variety of business contexts. PHINMA Education executives had been working with the team remotely in the months leading up to their arrival. While here, the students pitched their ideas to the leadership team, conducted field research with consumers around Manila and presented their final recommendations to management.

The goal is to provide students with the opportunity to ‘learn by doing’ through the challenge of introducing a new product, service or customer experience for their Partner company. This requires students to also focus on building contextual intelligence and team effectiveness skills while delivering value in an unfamiliar context.

The design pitches from Harvard students, presented on May 18, provide PHINMA Education with valuable insights as the organization continues to strengthen the care and support mechanisms that help low-income students and families persist and succeed in college.

“We are extremely grateful to PHINMA Education and all the FIELD Global Capstone Project Partner organizations for all they do on behalf of our students,” said Professor Joe Fuller, faculty chair for the FIELD Global Capstone. “The students benefit immeasurably from this experience and we hope the partner organizations do as well.”

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