Impact: Purposeful Work

Endowed support for the Bates Center for Purposeful Work empowers students to connect their academic experiences with meaningful career paths, fostering skills, resilience, and a sense of direction that align with their values and aspirations.

Entrepreneurial Expertise

two students holding a big check — The 2023 first-place winners of the Bobcat Ventures pitch competion were Abby Segal ’23 (left) and Jacob Iwowo ’23. Segal pitched her startup business to inspire and encourage women to break into the male-dominated world of professional magic. Iwowo won for a program to connect young soccer players around the world with opportunities to play soccer at U.S. colleges through scholarship support. (Ken Williams ’23 for Bates College)

The Chris G. Barbin ’93 Entrepreneurship Fund supports programs like Bobcat Ventures, practitioner-taught courses during Short Term, speaker series, student internships, and participation in off-campus conferences and workshops related to entrepreneurship.

The Chris G. Barbin ’93 Entrepreneurship Fund

FY24 Book Value: $438,813.47
FY24 Market Value: $456,587.90
Amount Spent to Support Bates Student Internships in FY25: $23,569.92

Established by Chris G. Barbin ’93, this fund supports the Purposeful Work program with a preference for curricular and co-curricular experiences that build entrepreneurial expertise for students.

From Spectators to Players

Ethan Chan ‘25 of Westborough, Mass., and Josephine Lao ‘25 of Changsha, China, had Purposeful Work internships in Boston with the firm Savills, one of the world’s leading real estate service providers, working with Nick Beati ‘20, an associate director.

“We really saw this opportunity to bolster our team with passionate, young researchers,” Beati says. “Ethan and Josephine immersed themselves quickly, taking full advantage of every opportunity.”

For Chane and Lao, the internship wasn’t just about analyzing data — it was about stepping into the fast-paced world of strategy and decision-making.

For Lao, the experience was transformative. She compared her journey to watching a Red Sox game at Fenway Park. “As a first-year at Bates, I was like an audience member, observing and trying to understand the game,” she says. “Now, I feel like a player — I’m in it, actively contributing and making decisions.”

Chan echoed that sentiment, saying the experience strengthened his confidence in his abilities. “I’ve learned to advocate for myself, recognize my strengths, and think more broadly about my future,” he says. “This internship wasn’t just about career skills—it was about seeing the bigger picture of where I want to go.”

Career Insights

Among the many students who’ve been supported by the Center for Purposeful Work in recent years is Aasya Patel ’26, an economics major with a mathematics minor from Indore, India, who was a Purposeful Work intern at Wolfe Research in midtown Manhattan last summer.

THESE PHOTOGRAPHS SHOULD NOT BE USED ON SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS.

Aasya Patel ’26 of Needham, Mass., majoring in economics with a minor in mathematics, poses on the basement level of the office building where she works as an Equity Research Intern, funded by Purposeful Work, for the Quant, Economics and Portfolio Strategy Team at Wolfe Research, LLCat 757 3rd Ave 6th Floor, New York, N.Y.

“I worked on some current projects for my mentor, as well as helped him in narrowing research models for potential future research topics. I used Time-Series methods to forecast commodity stock indexes, as well as did research from a macroeconomic perspective on factors that could affect their returns.” — Aasya Patel ’26 majoring in economics with a minor in mathematics, poses for a portrait during her Purposeful Work internship at Wolfe Research in New York City. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College)

Wolfe is a sell-side equity research firm that analyzes financial securities for trading. In her work with the firm’s quant, economics and portfolio strategy team, Patel used time-series methods, which elucidate patterns and trends over time, to forecast commodity stock indexes. She also conducted macroeconomic research on factors affecting returns.

Her Bates coursework in time-series econometrics was particularly valuable, she said. “A shoutout to professors [Austin] Smith and [Daniel] Riera-Crichton for how well they covered these topics at Bates!”

She also had the opportunity to attend panels and presentations, teaching her “valuable skills in engaging with an audience, particularly in a finance context — an area I hadn’t previously encountered.”