As a Babson student, you have numerous opportunities to take action on issues that matter to you alongside your professional and personal pursuits. Our undergraduate curriculum and our Entrepreneurial Thought & Action® (ET&A™) methodology emphasize the skills and mindset needed to create positive change wherever you end up in your life and career.
During your time on campus, you will gain real-world experience and competencies in creating positive social impact whether locally, nationally, or globally. Along the way you will be introduced to the multiple pathways for being a changemaker, from social entrepreneurship to activism to the social sector to impact careers.
Greater Boston nonprofits that students work with
Average hours per week Babson students work with community-assistance programs
Babson undergraduates working on community-based projects a year
The Institute for Social Innovation offers programming and resources to help you understand how you and your peers can advance the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including issues like inequality, climate change, poverty, and education. The Institute provides guidance and tools to help you understand who you need to be—and what you need to do—to make your desired change in the world.
Students passionate about creating social impact can apply to the Natalie Taylor Scholar program, which combines academic and co-curricular experiences to help students advance one or more of the aforementioned UN Sustainable Development Goals. Many Taylor Scholar alumni have become successful social entrepreneurs, social intrapreneurs, and social sector leaders. As part of this program, you take two courses in our entrepreneurship division: Be the Change: Evaluating Social Impact, and Scholar in Action.
Recently, three Taylor Scholars led a project for a new garden space on campus that honors the memory of Sudeeksha Bhati ’22, a Global Scholar and student leader who passed away in 2020.
Babson Sustainability Interns are undergraduate campus leaders who run office hours every weekday, connecting students to a wealth of resources, activities, opportunities, and ideas on climate change and other issues impacting our environment. They work on initiatives like Babson’s Good Business Index and the Slash the Trash campaign.
Each tax season, Babson students use their education to help people file their returns as part of the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program, offered through the Institute for Social Innovation. Find out how the program provides students, such as Emily Wang '26, with both an opportunity to give back and a chance to grow skills outside the classroom.
You can put your entrepreneurial skills to use while giving back through Babson’s Community Action Program (CAP). Students have opportunities to engage with local organizations, including Community Servings, Cradles to Crayons, and Friends of the Homeless of the South Shore. You could mentor youth at local organizations such as the Boys and Girls Club of Boston and the Needham Housing Authority or be trained through the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program to prepare taxes for low-income community members during the tax season.
Work-study-eligible students are also paid for their community service hours.
Given the privilege of being a student at Babson, I love having the opportunity to use my entrepreneurial mindset when giving back to the community and helping others.
During campus breaks, you can engage in intensive (and sometimes life-changing) service experiences, whether helping to build affordable housing in the Gulf Coast or El Salvador, or to teach entrepreneurship to youth in underserved communities in Tanzania or Guatemala.
Follow these students as they volunteer with Habitat for Humanity in Monroe, North Carolina during a Babson Service Immersion Spring Break Trip.
In addition to the Taylor Scholars, Babson provides a solid foundation for undergraduate students looking to actively and professionally pursue social impact causes.
All undergraduates take Socio-Ecological Systems (SES), one of our signature courses, which teaches students how to think in systems through learning about a part of nature (for example, water management, food systems, farming, and natural disasters) and their role in protecting and managing it. After taking SES, you have an understanding of integrated sustainability, and how people, communities, and businesses need to work together to preserve our planet.
In addition to SES, we offer a variety of courses in the liberal arts and sciences as well as in business and finance that introduce students to social impact concepts and initiatives. These include introduction to sustainability, social media etiquette, social impact across the globe, corporate social responsibility, and how to think entrepreneurially about social and environmental issues.
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(Socio-Ecological Systems) is about teaching them the ways we can try to make changes and to foster more sustainable systems. These are tools that apply to whatever they want to do.
Our undergraduate program provides students with the opportunity to specialize in one or more concentrations. With over 20 options, you can tailor your degree beyond the business and liberal arts and science foundations our degree provides. Students interested in learning more about social impact have options that cover the wide range of our curriculum, including:
There’s always something to do on our campus. Among the 100+ clubs founded by Babson undergraduates are clubs focusing on social and environmental issues and chapters of national organizations. Opportunities include:
Some of our student clubs and organizations also have a special-interest housing component. Living-Learning Communities are housing options where undergraduate students can live on campus with other students who share similar passions and goals. Many options, including some for first-year students, focus on social impact, including:
Leadership, athletics, the arts, clubs: check out all the ways to experience campus. Or, if you’re ready to apply, start your application now!
