December Stillman Student of the Month
Below is the feature for December’s Leadership Blog Stillman Student of the Month, an interview adopted from the Stillman Exchange of Andrew Kriner, Leadership Class of 2013. The Stillman Exchange chooses outstanding seniors as their Stillman Standout seniors in their bi-weekly papers.
Stillman Standout Senior Andrew Kriner Aspires for the Best
By Beverly Makarios
Stillman News Editor
As a senior, Andrew Kriner, displays exceptional qualities that have made him this week’s featured Stillman Standout Senior. As a Sport Management major, he expects to graduate in May with future plans of studying law. Whether it is landing a job opportunity through his current internship or pursuing other available options, Andrew demonstrates qualities that will surely bring him success. In the following interview, The Stillman Exchange talks to Andrew about his internship experiences with Seton Hall University Athletics, his love for soccer that led him to start his own Club Soccer team and a study abroad experience in Ireland that showed him a different side of business.
Beverly Makarios: How did you receive your internship with Seton Hall University Athletics? What did this internship entail?
Andrew Kriner: I received this internship by initially getting involved and working with the marketing staff for athletics at SHU. At that time I was usually the person swiping ID cards for students to get Pirate Pride points, or just helping set up tables and events for the staff. As the semester moved on I started doing more and more with the staff and inquired about an internship with them for the following semester. Once I got the internship I started doing more in depth tasks with them. I worked at basketball games preparing and running the on-court promotions at the Prudential Center and at Walsh Gymnasium. In addition to the game day requirements, I also worked to benchmark our marketing program against other top schools in the country. I looked at everything from social media programs, promotions, fan contests (the equivalent of Pirate Pride) and website layouts. Then I worked with the staff to improve and implement some of the ideas we saw other schools doing at that time.
BM: What skills did you learn from this internship that you have applied to your Seton Hall career and beyond?
AK: The main skill I learned from this internship was critical thinking and problem solving. Being on the court at a major event, like a men’s basketball game at the Prudential Center, is a very stressful situation. Working with the promotions and having to think ahead and solve problems on the fly to keep the game running smoothly is something that I learned and honed over the season. Another thing I learned is to never be satisfied with what you have. By looking at other athletic programs across the country I realized that the Athletic Marketing at Seton Hall University is truly up there with the best. However, instead of basking in this and stopping, to truly be great and continue to be great you have to constantly work to better yourself.
BM: What interested you most in pursuing Sport Management? What are your post-grad plans?
AK: I’ve been a sports fan my entire life, I grew up playing soccer and continue to play here on the Club Soccer team I founded this year. I realized that if I couldn’t play professional sports that I still wanted to be involved with a sports organization. Obviously sport management gives me the best chance to reach this dream as an undergraduate degree. My post grad plans are to go to law school. At this point I’m not sure where yet.
BM: What would you say you value most as a member of the Leadership Honors program?
AK: The most valuable thing about the Leadership Honors program is the opportunity it gives us for real world experience with corporate executives. I think the business classes do a good job preparing us for the academic aspect of business but Leadership brings executives from different industries to the students to learn from them in a “hands on manner”. The Junior Year mentoring project in which every student is paired with an executive mentor and required to create a project is really a capstone to the learning throughout freshman and sophomore year.
BM: How did your study abroad experience in Ireland help shape you as a student? What did you like best about this experience?
AK: From a business student standpoint, the trip shaped me by showing me how businesses are run in a different country. We visited multiple Irish companies and got to talk with executives of those companies about how they run their businesses and then compared them to American based companies. When looking at companies in different countries, many people forget about how different cultures affect different business decisions. This trip made me much more aware about such differences in cultures and how they can affect companies.
The best part about the trip was being in a foreign country with my classmates and friends. It was a great bonding experience with my classmates in leadership and it developed into some truly great friendships and memories.
BM: Would you recommend students to participate in study abroad programs like this? Why?
AK: Absolutely, I went on a ten day trip over spring break and I think it would be great for anyone to go on. There clearly is not as much of a financial burden being gone for ten days as there is for being gone for an entire semester. Having said that, ten days is plenty of time to get a taste of the culture and have a great time over-seas.
Contact Beverly at,
beverly.makarios@student.shu.edu