Baylor University MBA Students Recognized for Prison Entrepreneurship Program

Newswise - Baylor University's MBA students are one of six MBA programs from across the United States and Europe to be recognized by the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) in its TeamMBA Awards. GMAC confers the honor in recognition of commitment to community engagement and corporate social responsibility. The schools received the awards at the GMAC Annual Industry Conference in June.

Baylor University's Hankamer School of Business is winner of the Service Award for a Collaborative Program. More than 30 MBA students from the school volunteer regularly as business plan mentors for inmates in a Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP). Assigned to individual PEP participants, Baylor MBAs spend at least an hour per week helping inmates with business plans. Additionally, Baylor MBAs help prisoners learn about business etiquette, making a sales pitch, and how to redirect their entrepreneurial skills into legitimate businesses.

"The PEP program, now in its fifth year, serves 80 to 100 students each for two classes per year," said Laurie Wilson, director of graduate business degree programs. "Because it offers so much, including valuable counsel from business people, PEP seeks a genuine commitment from the inmates who participate." The application form is some 20 pages long. Prisoners get dropped if they don't take the program seriously. But the results are significant: Once back in society, PEP graduates gain employment in an average of just 10 days. Their recidivism rate is just under 5 percent, vs. 50 percent nationwide and 75 percent in Texas. "Their lives are genuinely being changed," Wilson said.

(NOTE TO JOURNALISTS: VIDEO ABOUT BAYLOR'S PRISON ENTREPRENEURSHIP PROGRAM MAY BE VIEWED ON YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnuS_2l7xWc. LENGTH = 4:41.)