Ten BYU-Hawaii Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) members recently returned from Dallas, Texas, where they were able to secure a top-60 finish in the competition held during the organization's National Exposition. This places the BYUH SIFE group in the top 6% of all SIFE teams nationally.
During the past year, BYUH SIFE completed projects in countries such as China, India and the Philippines, as well as in Hawaii. The overall theme of SIFE is to "change the world" by teaching the importance of a free enterprise. Students complete educational and service projects in five areas: market economics, personal success skills, entrepreneurship, financial management, and ethics. The competition consists of an oral presentation and written report of the team's projects during the past year to a panel of judges.
Nathan Tilton, past president of BYUH SIFE and a recent graduate, said, "The national competition at SIFE allows us to see what other teams are doing to change the world. As always, we are very well respected by our peers for the projects that were completed at BYU-Hawaii. Most teams have financial support and resources that far outweigh our own, but we still amaze people with what we can do."
Alan Doan, a senior information systems major from Cowgill, Missouri, who is the incoming BYUH SIFE president, agreed. "Dallas went very well. Our presentation came off as well as we could have hoped. More importantly, it served to open our eyes as to what we can do as a team. A lot of our members came together just a few months before the competition, so seeing all the other presentations helped a lot. We're excited about next year."
For example, Doan pointed out the group has grown from six to 34 members and has reorganized. "We have some of the best students in campus involved, and a lot of faculty are getting behind us" he said. "In turn, we're able to tackle some new, exciting projects such as initiatives to teach leadership in Saipan and Tonga. We're also pitching a project that might take us to Ghana and Uganda, and we're working in our own community to help kids get into college."
Dr. William Neal, Assistant to the President and one of the BYUH SIFE advisors, said the organization is also trying to expand its Business Advisory Board by involving more business representatives in the BYUH projects.
While in Dallas, the BYU-Hawaii students met several other SIFE teams, learned about other projects. BYUH SIFE, for example, has been invited by the new national champions, La Sierra University in Riverside, California, to participate in their "Build-A-Village" project that creates opportunity and housing for refugees in Darfur, Sudan. Additionally, the Seasider group is teaming up with SIFE sponsor, YSN.com (Your Success Network), to provide continual beta testing of their surveys and strategic planning.
The BYU-Hawaii team also participated in a career fair in Dallas that featured over 75 companies — many of them with global operations — that were actively recruiting and "genuinely interested in what SIFE has to offer," said Doan. He pointed out many of the recruiters were top-level executives, and "to get that kind of networking was invaluable."
Dr. Ronald Miller of the BYU-Hawaii Psychology Department stressed, "Participation in the SIFE National Exposition is worth it just for the access to the Career Fair"; and Dr. Neal noted many organizations "have preferential hiring of SIFE members."
BYUH SIFE student Benson Massey, for example, was encouraged by the job offers he received to work in his hometown in India when he graduates.
Doan added while the group will be "slimmed down" during the summer, they still have projects underway and they're looking ahead to next year's nationals, which will be held in Chicago in May 2008.
