Tuck at Trinity
Through a partnership with the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, Trinity College this year offered a new January Term program, Tuck Business Bridge, which focuses on building essential business skills needed to help launch rewarding careers.
At Trinity’s Innovation Hub in downtown Hartford, 37 undergraduate students took part in an intensive classroom experience that included a capstone team project, recruiting services, and one-on-one career guidance. Full or partial scholarships from the Raether Family Charitable Trust enabled all interested students to participate in the program.
Through applied sessions in business communications, financial accounting, corporate finance, managerial economics, marketing, and spreadsheet modeling led by Tuck’s M.B.A. faculty, students deepened their leadership, presentation, and collaborative skills to become better decision-makers and communicators.
The program also delivered personalized career resources designed to help students transition into a successful career, and students had access to a vibrant Bridge alumni community eager to offer mentorship, to share job and network opportunities, and to provide counsel.
Participant Lizzie Nelson ’26 of Rockville, Maryland, said, “The program was intense but important. Tuck Professor Leslie Robinson said that what you put into the program is what you’ll get out of it. I got a good amount out of it because I put a lot of work in.”
Nelson, who is majoring in film studies and minoring in writing, rhetoric, and media studies, noted that the program was different from typical classes at Trinity. “It was almost 70 hours of in-class instruction time over three weeks, not including time we spent with our study groups working on our capstone projects outside of class,” she said. “We also consulted with an M.B.A. at Dartmouth on our capstone. It was a ton of work in a condensed period of time. During a normal semester, you have four classes, plus extracurriculars, but this was a dedicated environment where all you had to focus on was this program. I would wake up, go to class all day, do the homework, and go to bed. It was a grind, but it was the only thing on your mind.”
Former Trinity Board Chair Paul Raether ’68, H’14, P’93, ’96, ’01 and family—also Tuck alumni—were enthusiastic about bringing the program to Trinity. “Trinity’s liberal arts education has prepared legions of alumni for success in careers across the disciplines,” said Raether. “The Tuck Business Bridge Program will now add to the undergraduate experience and give our students another significant leg up as they enter the workforce.”
Sonia Cardenas, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the faculty, noted, “We are so grateful to the Raether family for supporting this exciting partnership and expanding the range of opportunities our students have during the January Term. The program complements the Trinity Plus curriculum, amplifying the power of a liberal arts education with essential business skills that students can apply to any field.”
Photo by Nick Caito
Tuck Business Bridge participants Ethan Cobb ’26, Linh Ha ’27, Charlie Vail ’25, and Carl Callahan ’25
