Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals
During the fall of 2003 a marketing research project was conducted by a team of MBA students from the Monterey Institute of International Studies on behalf of CDS International. The purpose of the research was to examine several aspects of a program sponsored by CDS, the Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals (CBYX) program. The research objectives included:
The questionnaire was designed to include sections which addressed the topics listed above, as well as to collect current contact information and demographic information about alumni. The research study was conducted using an on-line questionnaire hosted by Infopoll.com. Data were collected over a 15-day period during November 2003. Over 500 alumni were contacted via e-mail to participate in the study. Responses to the questionnaire were received from 221 alumni of the past 20 years of the CBYX program. The results of the study were analyzed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software program, as well as on-line analysis resources provided by the questionnaire hosting company.
The results of the survey are available in a PowerPoint slide show.
About the Research Team
The research team was made up of two MBA candidates from the Monterey Institute of International Studies, Lara Bollweg and Meredith Smith.
Lara Bollweg: Lara, a native of Minneapolis, MN, received a BA in German and Business from the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, Minnesota. To gain fluency in German, she spent a year studying at the University in Munich. In 1999-2000, she participated in the 16th Congress-Bundestag Exchange for Young Professionals program through CDS International where she spent a semester studying at the Universität Potsdam and a semester working in Berlin for the Jugendinitiative (Youth Initiative) Expo 2000.
Ms. Bollweg received her MBA in December 2003 from the Fisher School of International Business. After graduation, she rejoined her former employer, MarketResponse International, which is an international marketing research firm in Minneapolis, MN. She began her new position of Senior International Project Director in January, 2004.
Meredith Smith: Meredith attended Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland, where she majored in Political Science and double minored in International Business and French. While in college, she spent a semester abroad in Rouen, France studying at the Institut de Formation Internationale and lived with a host family to learn about the local culture and improve her foreign language skills. She also studied at the American University's Washington Semester Program and interned at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
Meredith worked as a Research Assistant for a U.S. Senate Campaign in Denver, CO. As a Research Assistant, she focused on opposition research and issues research. Following the completion of the campaign, she chose to continue her education at the Monterey Institute of International Studies in the advanced-entry MBA program. While attending the Monterey Institute, she volunteered for the Academy of International Business (AIB) conference hosted by the Fisher Graduate School of International Business. Meredith also completed her degree in December 2003, and returned to the Denver area to begin a career in marketing with a focus on international markets.
