Axe ’Em, Jacks!
NACOGDOCHES, Texas –– As Christian Women’s Job Corps Nacogdoches continues to gain both clients and volunteers, students in Stephen F. Austin State University’s Nelson Rusche College of Business are providing assistance to help with that growth while developing skills for their future careers.
“This is a multiclass real-world learning project under the guidance of several faculty members, and we’re really excited about it,” said Dr. Marcus Cox, coordinator for SFA’s Business and Community Services office and associate professor of management and marketing. “We want to thank the CWJC leadership team for this opportunity for our students to not only apply their business skills but also give back to the community. We hope this is the beginning of a growing partnership between CWJC and the Rusche College of Business.”
A registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, CWJC offers professional skills training and job preparation, mentorship and personal development, and faith-based support and encouragement to provide local women with the skills and resources they need to overcome challenges, discover their purpose and build brighter futures.
“Christian Women’s Job Corps Nacogdoches has undergone a huge transformation over the past year,” said Jasmine Hassan, CWJC executive director. “With new staff and a reenergized mission, we were very grateful to give Rusche students a rare opportunity to help with the foundations of rebuilding our organization to be stronger and up to date.”
During the 2024-25 academic year, undergraduate students in two Rusche College of Business courses focused their efforts on CWJC: “Strategic Management,” taught by Cox, and “Principles of Employee Development,” taught by Dr. Marice Kelly, assistant professor of business communication and legal studies.
Strategic management students offered ideas on how to manage growth, increase brand awareness, coordinate volunteers and engage with the community over social media, especially for events like the Pine Top Pickleball Tournament, CWJC’s annual fundraiser. Student recommendations ranging from the CWJC van to Google Ads for business, Facebook business accounts and search engine optimization were particularly helpful, Hassan said.
“We have been able to implement the ideas, and we continue to refer back to the presentations to brainstorm,” she said.
Employee development students researched instructional resources to help update CWJC’s curriculum for its clients. Students conducted strength, weakness, opportunity and threat, or SWOT, analyses to pinpoint the resources with the most benefits and fewest drawbacks for CWJC. Benefits included affordability, multilanguage offerings, and availability of an instructor’s guide and online content options, while drawbacks included high costs, aging content, instructor’s fees, certification requirements and lack of hands-on exercises.
The employee development students also continued a Flare app discussion started by the strategic management students during the previous semester. Kelly’s students adopted Flare to communicate with each other throughout the spring semester and determine if the app would work well for CWJC volunteers’ needs. They found it easy to use and reliable.
“We will be using the Flare app this fall semester for our volunteers, but we also definitely enjoyed the curriculum recommendations for our job readiness class,” Hassan said. “We are making decisions on two of them, but having Dr. Kelly’s students complete the research and have SWOT analyses really saved our staff an incredible amount of time and work.”
Kelly said working with CWJC to help both business students and CWJC clients prepare for their future careers was rewarding.
“It was gratifying to create a service-learning project for a local organization that also taught students how to conduct research and create a SWOT analysis on various instructional materials,” she said. “It has also been a pleasure to work with CWJC, and I look forward to collaborating on future projects with them.”
Hassan said she hopes to continue working with SFA students in the future, as well.
“They were hands-on, critical thinkers and were very excited to help us. We enjoyed their perspectives, ideas and comments,” she said. “Being able to help a local mission directly, instead of using standard textbook scenarios, is definitely a win for everyone and a priceless experience. I encourage other nonprofits and businesses to utilize our wonderful students who are right here in Nacogdoches, Texas.”
For more information on Christian Women’s Job Corps Nacogdoches, visit cwjcnac.org. For more information on SFA’s Business and Community Services office, visit sfasu.edu/cob/services/bcs.