National Hispanic Business Association

By: Marisol Martinez
University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

As the Executive VP of External Relations, I have been working towards expanding the Northern Region into other schools unaware of NHBA and its benefits. The ways I have been trying to expand are by making contacts with students at schools like the University of Illinois at Chicago and Aurora University, which maintain a high Hispanic attendance rate. Another way I have been trying to expand the Northern Region is that I created a Northern Region group on Facebook where current members as well as I, can invite others to learn about NHBA and the Northern Region. The group contains a brief history and overview of NHBA. With access to the group, anyone could find out about upcoming events like the Annual Conference in Las Vegas as well as specific information pertaining to the Northern Region.

Recently under the Northern Region, a couple of exciting events have happened. At Notre Dame, they officially merged with the League of Black Business Students to form the Diverse Student Business Association (DBSA) in order to serve the wide range and growing number of multicultural students on their campus.

At Ohio State University, the HBSA chapter completed its Sixth Annual Soccer Classic raising $3,800 to attend the Annual Conference that will be held in Las Vegas. They had a turn out of 20 teams in a World Cup Style tournament, which nears 230 people. Target was a key sponsor of the event as well as Soccer Plus, E&Y, La X and Coca-Cola. Through the sponsorships as well as funding from the University, they were able to cover all costs and turn profits.