By Saman Baghestani

On April 17^th 2014, the SMCC Business Club made its first donation of $1,000 to the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital at Maine Medical Center! This donation represents the culmination of several years of investment learning activities conducted entirely by students in the Business Club at SMCC.

The Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital is the only full-care children’s hospital in Maine, and they see over 52,000 patients a year. The nurses have ranked in the top 3% in worldwide nursing excellence surveys, and the hospital was rated the fourth safest hospital in the U.S. The Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital is supported by a great community that surrounds it, as the children that are patients couldn’t be in better care than they are there.

Our donation was all profit earned from investing in stocks. Five years ago, the Business Club received $2,000 from alum so that future students could learn how stocks and investments work. That alum gave us a goal: to raise $3,000 and donate the profits earned to the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital. Over those five years, there have been gains and losses because the stock market can be unpredictable. This year we finally reached our goal of $3,000 and were eager to give our donation.

As the spring semester comes to a close, some of you may be graduating and heading on to a new school, or into a new career and some of you may be back at SMCC in the fall. Wherever you’re headed, it’s important to keep in mind that both success and failure are possibilities. Set one goal for yourself – it could be as small as getting an “A” on your next test, or it could be as big as getting that big summer internship that so many people are applying to. Setting goals helps us as people become better because they are something to work toward and to look forward to. Perhaps it is human nature to get sidetracked from these goals in life, but here’s a big tip: don’t be afraid to take a risk. If you sit in a corner you’re whole life without reaching to grab something you really want, then you won’t know how great the success of getting that will feel. So, here’s one of my goals to get us started: Get at least a 3.5 GPA this semester.

Have great rest of the semester and a wonderful summer!  The Business Club meets on Thursdays in Hague Hall from 12:30 – 1:15, and it is open to all students on campus.