“Being a part of MSBA is not just a summer experience – it’s a lifelong membership.”
Family.
It’s a strong word we all tend to throw around loosely these days, particularly in sports. You hear it in locker rooms all the time; the notion of respect, the emphasis on teamwork and unconditional support for the man/woman next to you is going to make the difference between winning and losing. Parallel to our favorite athletes, the support of a group, your family, is ultimately going to be the driver of your professional goals and performance.
Our family – our MSBA Community – just had its third birthday. If you take a look at our relatively short lifespan, we’ve grown exponentially from our inaugural year in 2012. In fact since our inception, we’ve been the launch pad and support system for over 60 of the sports industry’s next wave of leaders; quite the feat for something that was only an idea four summers ago.
As I stood there at our Commencement Celebration filled with all the new faces that we brought into our family this summer, I realized how important this program was to not only our students, but to all the mentors, speakers, and internship providers involved. After hearing industry peers describe their passion for MSBA’s mission and for general career mentorship, it became apparent to me that our industry is full of remarkable people with big hearts. We couldn’t be more blessed to have so many of these amazing people in our lives on both a personal and professional level. Many thanks for all those who took time out of their busy summers to make MSBA 2014 the best it could be. We all look forward to your continued involvement and support in launching the careers of our industry’s next wave of leaders.
MSBA 2014 has been a year of firsts. We’ve gone to our first NY Mets game, trekked out to NJ to visit the Prudential Center, hung out in the sweet office of Modell’s, had our first group sweat with our friends at SWERVE , heard from our first ever NFL agent and found out that if you can play, you can play. Pretty incredible to think we did all that and more in just eight short weeks! I could ramble on and on about other great summer highlights, but who better to tell our story than our students themselves?! If you haven’t already, be sure to read through the Student Blog to see what we were up to.
The saying goes that you can’t select your family/community, whereas MSBA completely debunks that myth. For those who chose to leave their dreams behind and move to NYC, they leave with a sense of purpose, better understanding of themselves and of the industry they aspire to break into. Most importantly, they leave with 24 new friends and a community of young, established and C-Level executives. I’m looking forward to 20 years from now, when choosing to be a part of our MSBA Community will be noted by many of the industry’s top executives as the catalyst for their professional success. Being a part of MSBA is not just a summer experience – it’s a lifelong membership.