The Career Design Lab is thrilled to celebrate the successes of all of our Columbia University School of Professional Studies students and alumni.

This week we highlight a student from Nonprofit Management program. We are proud to congratulate Anna Goula on her role as a conference speaker for The Breast Cancer Research Foundation.

Ringing the Opening Bell at the New York Stock Exchange with The Breast Cancer Research Foundation was a defining moment that brought my academic learning to life. It allowed me to apply the leadership and strategic communication skills I developed at Columbia’s Nonprofit Management program while advancing a cause I deeply care about. I have always been passionate about cross-sector partnerships, and this experience demonstrated how collaboration between the nonprofit and corporate sectors can amplify awareness, mobilize resources, and drive meaningful impact in advancing scientific research. The classes I took in the program gave me the knowledge, confidence, and passion to make that impact possible.

Through my work with The Breast Cancer Research Foundation, I had the incredible honor of ringing the Opening Bell at the New York Stock Exchange on October 17th in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. As a recent graduate of Columbia University’s School of Professional Studies Nonprofit Management program, I never could have imagined that my master’s degree would open the door to such a meaningful opportunity—to help raise awareness of the urgent need to fund scientific research, especially for metastatic breast cancer, for which there is still no cure. Today, 1 in 8 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime—a powerful reminder of how vital this work remains.

One piece of advice I’d give other SPS students is to take courses outside of your program. Interacting with students from other SPS cohorts gave me the chance to learn about different industries and discover how skills like negotiation and analytics could be applied effectively in the nonprofit sector.

Do you have a success story that you would like to share? We want to hear it!