The 2026 Impact Investing Competition was held in person on Feb. 20 in the Peter B. Lewis Building at Case Western Reserve University, Weatherhead School of Management. The competition featured both undergraduate and graduate teams, with student teams presenting their investment strategies to a panel of professional judges from diverse fields in impact investing. Teams competed on strategies of deploying capital to help transform vacant and underutilized industrial land into productive, job-generating assets.
This competition allows teams to tackle real-world impact investing challenges and showcases innovative solutions to managing investment portfolios aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The competition was organized by Fowler Center fellows: Victoria Schurr, Chad Gepfrey, Delisa Williams, Zaija Pelligree, Haley Cummins and Molly Egan. The case was written by fellows Gepfrey and Pelligree.
The panel of judges included:
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Victor Barbalato, The Cleveland Foundation
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Jeff McCourt, Southshore LLC
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Olivia Dong, Site Readiness for Good Jobs Fund
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Chris Seelig, Colliers
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Joan Chase, Cuyahoga Land Bank
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Elizabeth Finazzo, Collier
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Kyle Regan, INSIGHT2PROFIT
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William Vogelgesang, EPOCH Pi
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Kirk Schmitt, Glenmede
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Kirstyn Wildley, McDonald Hopkins
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Ben Cooper, Key Bank
The Fowler Center for Business as an Agent of World Benefit at Weatherhead would like to thank the students and judges who helped make our 2026 Impact Investing Competition a big success.
This year, student teams were tasked with to deploy $75 million to accelerate the redevelopment of vacant and underutilized industrial land in Cleveland, with flexibility to invest in nearby sites within Cuyahoga County that directly support Cleveland’s economic growth. Students identified economic and environmental metrics aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) to support their investments.
Each team had a total of seven minutes to present their pitch, followed by a six-minute Q&A session with the judges.Teams with the strongest ROI’s in social, governance and environmental areas won the competition.
A networking reception followed the competition, where students connected with judges and industry professionals before the announcement of the winners.
Winning Teams:
1st Place: Mandate Secured
Shilpi Bardhan, Jaan Desai, Mark Takasaki
2nd Place: Case Capital
Alex Sirvent Suarez, Julia Indyk, Amirali Rezaei, Manuel Rocha Pereyra
3rd Place: The Rolling Spartans
Alex Zou, Junaid Fahim, Yasmine Fazazi, Michelle Larbi, Marco Sustaita