Industry mentorship for students
UNIVERSITI Teknologi Petronas (UTP) students have been taken under the wings of technology and business consultants to become successful social entrepreneurs.
Forty selected students in the University Social Responsibility (USR) programme are now part of the Deloitte-UTP Kickstarter programme that began on Sept 26.
The mentorship programme aims to guide and accelerate student-led corporate social responsibility projects and matches 20 Deloitte consultants to the students in a mentor-mentee relationship.
The chosen projects are the student-led A-Qual Life and Beacon of Hope 2.0 projects.
The A-Qual Life Project focuses on providing the Orang Asli community with a source of sustainable water supply while the Beacon of Hope 2.0 is to introduce a summer camp for urban poor youths between the ages of 15 to 18.
The programme uses Deloitte’s 3S approach for social enterprises — Start, Scale and Sustain — and is designed to provide a step-by-step guide to help facilitate the development of a social enterprise.
It begins with a Virtual Kickstarter that equips students with the know-how in executing a social enterprise.
The two-day online course sees the company’s consultants providing advice and coaching on how to start, scale and soar a successful social enterprise.
This will cover topics like ideation and pitching, then developing an entrepreneurial plan, solution testing, project management 101 and marketing as they scale their projects. Students are then trained to ensure sustainability through benefits realisation and handover.
“It is heartening to see the passion from UTP students in wanting to serve their communities.
“In particular, during these challenging times, their projects truly embody the ‘Malaysia Prihatin’ spirit.
“We are proud to provide support to contribute our skills, knowledge, and business acumen to help students make an impact that matter in our communities,” said Deloitte Consulting Southeast Asia (SEA) executive director and programme lead Azhar Hussin.
UTP vice-chancellor Prof Dr Mohamed Ibrahim Abdul Mutalib said the university continuously looks for ways to provide a transformative educational experience for its students. One of the ways is through its USR.
“We place great importance on our USR, thus we embed it in the university’s overall vision and mission.
“It demonstrates the significance of our students being part of a community,” he said, adding that UTP emphasises making long-term and sustainable changes in the lives of their target communities.
The Kickstarter programme is part of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between UTP and Deloitte Malaysia to collaborate on various student development initiatives.
The MoU was signed by Deloitte Malaysia consulting leader and Deloitte SEA Consulting executive director Kavita Rekhraj and Prof Mohamed Ibrahim.
The signing ceremony was witnessed by Azhar and UTP deputy vice-chancellor Prof Dr Nor Hisham Hamid.