Darden’s Black Business Student Association (BBSA) recently hosted Black Business Experience Week to celebrate African American culture and explore different facets of black professional life. Vice President of Careers Adam Miller (Class of 2020) shared his perspective and a few photos from throughout the week. Check out BBSA’s Instagram to get to know club members and learn more about the organization.
The Black Business Student Association exists at Darden to celebrate African American culture. Our MBA members are active within the Charlottesville community, the classroom environment, social circles and during the job search process.
As BBSA vice president of careers, it’s my responsibility to help our members secure job offers with their dream companies. I happen to have a human resources background, and I get a ton of satisfaction out of using those skills to assist my classmates.
Last week, BBSA brought a variety of programming to the Darden Grounds during something we call Black Business Experience Week. February is Black History Month, and our timing of the week’s curated events was an intentional way to explore aspects of Black professional life.
A few of the week’s highlights included:
- “Profit to Passion”: A conversation with UVA alum and former NFL player Tony Covington and FinTech entrepreneur Christian Duffus (MBA ’00) about both turning profit into passion and leveraging passion to find profit
- “Hidden in Plain Sight”: A discussion with Darden Professor Laura Morgan Roberts about how to navigate workplace adversity, held in collaboration with the General Management & Operations Club
- Step performance by Omega Psi Phi Fraternity during First Coffee
- “Creativity, Connection & Culture”: A hip-hop performance by UVA Professor A.D. Carson followed by a discussion with Darden Professor Ed Freeman. Listen to Carson’s albums for free on bandcamp.com
- “Brewing Up Entrepreneurship”: The release of our very own BBSA beer at Three Notch’d Brewery in collaboration with the Darden School of Brew
- “Darden Past, Present & Future Reception”: An event in Washington, D.C., with more than 50 Darden alumni, faculty, current MBAs and prospective students
The objective of Darden’s Black Business Experience Week was to explore various aspects of Black professional life. We also spent a lot of time examining the current state of race in America.
For me, the most impactful part of the week was when I shared my personal story about what my blackness has meant to me during “Darden Stories,” an authentic, no-phones session modeled after Humans of New York.
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