Mexican Students Get Crash Course in American Business
July 5, 2002
Ten students with an entrepreneurial bent from Mexico's Monterrey Technical Institute are spending their summer in the United States learning how to succeed in business.
The students won a competition in Mexico among university teams developing business plans for new enterprises. First prize was six weeks attending a crash course in business at the University of Richmond's School of Continuing Studies.
Most of the 10 hope to open their own businesses back in Mexico, so the summer business boot camp had great appeal. So did the opportunity to make side trips to New York and Washington, D.C.
According to David Kitchen, director of summer programs at Richmond's School of Continuing Studies, Monterrey Technical Institute, is one of Mexico's most technologically advanced schools. "It's like walking through CNN." Kitchen set up the summer class as part of an exchange program between Richmond and Monterrey.
Only one of the Mexican exchange students is majoring in business; so an intense look at the whole scope of business seemed ideal. The idea is to get students to "see how the economy works," said Kitchen.
Xavier Mondragon, for example is majoring in industrial engineering, and two of his teammates are majoring in civil engineering and architecture. Mondragon's team came up with a business plan for a furniture manufacturing plant, and he is hoping that knowledge he gains in the classroom and contacts he makes here will help him realize his dream of actually opening it.
"Our teacher (Ken Newman, who has an MBA and 25 years of business experience) has taught us how business works," Mondragon says. "I have learned the American view, and when I begin working, I will know how Americans make business deals."
The students are touching all the bases: finance, accounting, marketing, economics and management. They also work on business presentation skills.
Besides learning key principles and business history, they study current business events: from Enron and Global Crossing to Rite Aid, WorldCom and Xerox, with reams of handouts.
They also have talked about innovative leaders like Jack Welsh, former CEO of General Electric, and the corporate university for employees he developed in Crotonville, N.Y.
Besides immersion in American business, the students also have spent weekends visiting Washington, D.C.; New York, where they saw "Phantom of the Opera" and a Mets game; and the Twin Oaks commune in nearby Louisa County.
Mondragon said the theft of the group's rental car made the trip to the nation's capital not only adventurous but instructive. He gave the rental company high marks for customer service when it quickly provided a replacement car.
"Obviously, we haven't let this class get in the way of their education," Newman said.