Kelsey Horvath
By Zoë Eitel
Kelsey Horvath always knew she wanted to return home to San Diego and work for the city’s Padres baseball team after graduation because she grew up going to games. Her time and education at DePaul made that a reality.
She took a San Diego sports consulting class while at DePaul, which brought her back to San Diego for a two-week-long project, during which Kelsey and her classmates worked on a sponsorship project for the team. After that, Kelsey saw an internship posting for the following summer and was hired as a corporate partnership intern due in part to her previous connections with the team’s staff.
Suite Operations Coordinator for San Diego Padres
BSB Marketing 2016
“I really got to know some of the Padres’ staff and kept in touch with them, networked my way back in and eventually made my way back to San Diego,” Kelsey says. “The fact that I get to work for my hometown team and one of the only major league teams in San Diego really is what I wanted the whole time I was in school, so dream come true.”
“It’s important to get to know people that are in your field and have those connections because you never know when they could be helping you down the road.”
As a Suite Operations Coordinator, Kelsey helps execute client events on a nightly basis while in season, and out of season, she helps plan events for sales staff to get face-to-face time with clients.
Kelsey wanted to go to a top-notch business school that provided access to great internships and jobs. DePaul was the perfect match. Even though classes and volleyball kept her busy, Kelsey took advantage of as many opportunities to work and gain experience as she could.
“Wherever I could fit something in, I tried to,” she says. “I worked with the Bears every Sunday because Sunday was our off day for volleyball, so I was at Soldier Field just doing game day stuff there, filling my time where I could.”
Kelsey says she also paid close attention to her emails because she would often receive newsletters sharing opportunities for jobs, internships or other experiences, such as shadowing the coach of the Chicago Bulls for a day.
