As you pursue your MBA, you’ll quickly discover how integral experiential learning opportunities are. STAR – Student Teams Achieving Results – is a unique consultative opportunity for UNC Kenan-Flagler MBA students to apply knowledge and concepts learned through coursework to real-life projects for real organizations.
Why STAR?
STAR complements your MBA experience by giving you the chance to apply proven consulting frameworks and methodology to real business projects domestically and around the world. In addition to strengthening your own portfolio, you’ll learn best practices in consulting, gathering market intelligence, and industry trend analysis. Throughout the process, you’ll practice leadership and teamwork skills, understand what makes an effective team, and learn how to analyze and present complex information to provide solutions to a business challenge.
This deeply engaging program combines the breadth of business experiences and knowledge of your STAR teammates from around the country and around the world, providing a new perspective, as well as developing your network through relationships built with clients.
What to expect
Over the course of a semester, you will join a small group of UNC Kenan-Flagler students as a team based on your collective experience, compatibility with the STAR projects, and interests. As an MBA student, you will have the opportunity to serve as a project leader to your team of qualified MBA and Undergraduate Business students, and work in partnership with UNC Kenan-Flagler faculty advisors and other experts.
During the 15-week program, you and your team will offer a solution to a real business scenario to worldwide organizations – just as you would in a real consulting environment. As any STAR alumni would tell you – the more you put into the experience, the more you’ll gain from it!
“The important lessons you learn in a classroom only get you so far. Learning theory and working through problems is valuable, but actually applying those learnings to an ambiguous, real-world application is a whole new challenge. By participating in STAR, our team was given a blank slate to figure out which concepts were most useful, how they were useful, and when they were useful as we prepared recommendations for our client."
More than 20 STAR teams work on real business problems each year in a consulting role with individual clients worldwide and across industries. Past partners include:
Healthcare
- GlaxoSmithKline
- Chimerix
- Ronald McDonald House Charities
- United Healthcare
Consumer goods, services and entertainment
- KIND
- NASCAR
- Coca-Cola
- Domino’s Pizza
Public services and education
- Hawkeye Indian Cultural Center
- North Carolina Botanical Garden
- Public Schools of North Carolina
- Summit Park
Technology, energy and manufacturing
- Duke Energy
- Strata Solar
- HondaJet
