New York—A select group of students at Yeshiva University’s Sy Syms School of Business are enjoying a real-life entrepreneurial experience this semester thanks to a new course called “Growing a Managing Business.” The class is open to students on both the Beren and Wilf campuses and aims to give them the unique opportunity to work as a consulting team together with a faculty member to advise and develop solutions for a business client on a chosen project. This year, that client was YU’s annual Seforim Sale, North America’s largest Jewish book sale, operated by YU students—from ordering merchandise to setting up the premises, marketing, accounting, and all the technology the project entails.

Leonard Fuld, clinical assistant professor of accounting, who is teaching the class. “Similar to PricewaterhouseCoopers or any outside firm, the idea was for them to look at the Sale and determine what needed the most attention…to give them the hands-on experience you don’t get in the classroom.” The students attended the sale, which ended two weeks ago, as consultants to study the operations, interview employees, and perform on-site analysis and real-time audits. The participating students also heard lectures from experts in law, banking, management, inventory management, accounting, and mergers and acquisitions.

Sy Syms Associate Dean Michael Strauss, entrepreneur in residence and clinical professor of management said, “The students address business problems in a hands-on manner and thereby develop their team-working and people skills, critical thinking, creative planning, management abilities, technical knowledge, and communication proficiency. The course is more akin to a business clinic one might find offered at one of the elite graduate business schools.”