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Diving into Community Development

Kaveh Sadeghian is a Marketing and International Public Health double major, with a strong interest in community development. How have his internships and trips to Guatemala and the Dominican Republic highlighted his IPS?

Kaveh Sadeghian with his Guatemalan homestay family, in traditional wear.
About Me

I hail from the grand old state of New Jersey and am the only child of, as my name may suggest, two Iranian immigrants. I've been fortunate to have a much needed but wonderfully fostered self-realization process here, one that began the moment I set foot on this campus.

I started my William & Mary odyssey as a Sharpe Community Scholar. The program opened my eyes to new perspectives on community engagement and development. With a Sharpe Grant, I traveled to Guatemala the following summer and interned with Social Entrepreneurs Corps, researching the differences in relief versus development models.

A Self-Designed Major & IPS

My courses at the College taught me how to observe, absorb, react, and question. This began to form my interest in the implicit undercurrents of healthcare, specifically when taking all the cultural and social influences into consideration. Two years later, I found myself deciding on a self-designed International Public Health major, specifically through a sociological and ethnographic perspective.

Kaveh Sadeghian with a child in Guatemala.At the same time, I wasn't quite satisfied with just the theory and thinking and questioning. Where was the bottom line and the accountability? I'm specifically interested in pursuing how innovative design, both in products and promotion, can be utilized to maximize the effects of public health campaigns. I had a great, complementary experience interning at the National Conference on Citizenship this past summer. While there, I worked on developing a method to measure and track institutionalized civic engagement in a company's corporate culture.

Through the Business School, I added a Marketing major with a concentration in Organizational Behavior & Leadership to my Individual Program of Study (IPS). Working with our chapter of  Net Impact, I was also able to expand on my summer experience and explore how sustainability can be interwoven into the fabric of corporate culture.

Kaveh Sadeghian applying fluoride treatments in the Dominican Republic, as part of SOMOS.
Impact & Engagement

While I've learned a great deal within the age-old (or in the case of Miller Hall, brand new) academic buildings, a great number of my lessons have taken place outside of those classrooms. I began diving into my interest with community development by co-founding William & Mary Dance Marathon, which has proved to be incredibly rewarding.

I also serve in the William & Mary Student Assembly as Vice-President and am a proud member of SOMOS (Student Organization for Medical Outreach & Sustainability). We just returned from our annual trip to the Dominican Republic, where the team is working on a number of public health and community development projects.

Kaveh Sadeghian inviting residents in the Dominican Republic to the health clinic.
Highlights

My experience at the Business School has only enhanced my experience at William & Mary. I began my time at the Business School with the Integrated Foundation Semester, which I absolutely loved. We were split up into teams of four or five and were expected to do a number of projects together in multiple businesses classes. The people on my team were nothing short of incredible, and our friendships have resounded beyond our time in the Foundation Semester.

The Business School also presented me with a number of opportunities to engage with some really amazing people. The Corporate & College Collaborative for Sustainability invited corporations, as well as students and faculty from 12 business schools throughout the nation, to sit together and discuss undergraduate sustainability education. It was an eye-opening and engaging event that truly challenged and pushed the boundaries of undergraduate business education.

I also had the opportunity to have coffee with Garner Anthony '53, the former Chairman and CEO of Cox Enterprises. It was a really humbling experience and also spoke volumes about the Business Program's commitment to its students.

Kaveh Sadeghian is confident that he will take steps in the right direction after he graduates from William & Mary.Next Steps

I've considered applying to an advertising school and pursuing a Masters in Design. However,  I may also end up jumping right into the workforce, be it with a non-profit in Washington DC, a firm in New York City, a micro-financing bank in Central America or Peace Corps in some other corner of the world. Regardless of which path I chose, I am confident that I'll be content and satisfied. Time and time again William & Mary has confirmed that with earnest eagerness and a healthy dose of curiosity, your next steps will always be in the right direction.