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From AI Club to Google Internship: A Q&A with Student Leader Francesca Kubica

From AI Club to Google Internship: A Q&A with Student Leader Francesca Kubica

MAIA executive director and Marshall student Francesca Kubica discusses student leadership and translating AI education into industry experience.

by: Alexander Bernard
01.12.26
Francesca Kubica

MAIA Executive Director and Marshall Student Francesca Kubica

[Photo Courtesy of Kubica]

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  • Kimon Drakopoulos

    Kimon Drakopoulos
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  • Jason Frenn

    Jason Frenn
    • Adjunct Professor of Clinical Business Communication

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Students like Francesca Kubica are leading the conversation on artificial intelligence. A third -year student majoring in AI for Business (BUAI), a joint program offered by USC Marshall and the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, Kubica also serves as executive director of the Marshall Artificial Intelligence Association (MAIA). As co-founder of the student organization, she supports students' professional goals through workshops and industry partnerships.

A member of the inaugural cohort of Marshall’s AI for Business program, Kubica is already putting her education and experience into practice. This past summer, she interned with Google’s Financial Planning & Analysis team.

In a Q&A with Marshall News, the student leader reflects on BUAI’s pioneering curriculum, the importance of AI proficiency, and how the program prepared her for a highly coveted internship.

Interviewer: What led you to enroll in the BUAI program?

Francesca Kubica: I’m originally from the Bay Area and being in the Bay Area, you’re influenced by tech, and I also was very interested in business. When I was applying for school and as a senior, I knew I wanted to study at the intersection of business and tech, but I wasn’t exactly sure what that was until I saw USC.

USC actually posted their BUAI major two weeks before I applied … I saw this major and I thought it was going to be the pivotal point of jumping onto a new industry while also maintaining my interest in tech and business.

You were in the first cohort of a brand new major. What was it like to help pioneer a program?

FK: When I look back on it, it was a really unique experience. I really enjoyed it because you got this one-on-one time with your director. At the time it was Kimon Drakopoulos and he’s very established in what he’s done in the past. He works on [the Greek government’s] AI advisory board]. You also get one-on-one time with the rest of your classmates. You get to facilitate what classes you’re taking.

For upcoming cohorts, their course curriculum has actually changed because of our feedback … That’s an experience that I don’t think a lot of people have unless they’re the first trailblazers of the program.

What professors or courses have made a major impact on your BUAI experience?

FK: BUAD 302: Communication Strategy in Business. What made this class so great was Jason Frenn [adjunct professor of clinical business communication].

He’s a notable international conference speaker and author. Every time he came to class, he made it worth it for us. He did not stick to the original lecture style. He brought in stories from his personal life and he felt like a person. He would always tell us, “Every single conversation you have is a sell. You’re always selling no matter where you are.”

He really was able to help me become a better speaker, more confident. I love that class. I think it’s one of the most valuable skills.

All of the universities are going to start having these programs. Why be the last when you can be the first?

— Francesca Kubica

MAIA Executive Director / BUAI Student

Why do you think it’s so important to have programs like BUAI?

FK: All of the universities are going to start having these programs. Why be the last when you can be the first?

With AI, everyone knows that it’s going to be the basis of work in the future … I think colleges, especially USC, are really getting ahead because they’ve already made a program focused on it. And the BUAI course curriculum is really applicable because you learn exactly what tools are the best right now, and then they bring in companies where we can actually consult them on what AI tools to use and why.

USC is really unique because they have a lot of industry connections. They’re bringing in people and allowing undergrad students to get connected and learn how to use AI, apply it, and do consulting much earlier than potentially an MBA student would.

Tell me a little bit about how your Google internship came about and what it was like.

FK: I was placed on the financial planning analysis team for the summer. It was awesome. I mean, there’s free food every day. I was based in Sunnyvale, but I also had the chance to travel to Chicago because most of my team was in Chicago. I got to meet my entire team and I worked on capital reallocation strategy. Basically I was working on trying to improve where budgets could be reallocated during each quarter. It helped understand more about corporate finance and also develop my skills in SQL and dashboarding.

How did you feel like your education within BUAI helped you in your internship?

FK: Because BUAI is a joint degree between Viterbi and Marshall, you take all the regular classes that a Viterbi major would … Those classes were integral to understanding basic coding and also being able to relate to engineers. Then on the flip side are the business classes. Because I was in FPA, I needed to know those accounting terms. [In BUAI], you take economics, accounting, finance, and those were integral to my internship.

We also have integrative AI classes. Specifically, one that helped me was my advanced operations class where we got to work on business cases every class. We would learn about the material and then we would immediately go into business cases.

Another class that was really integral for me was BUAD 312: Statistics and Data Science for Business. That was really helpful because you learn how to analyze data, how to collect data, how to connect data to business problems, and how you can create recommendations from it. And you learn about R, which is a programming language.

Overall, I think all my course curriculum has been helpful in giving me experience before my internship, and I used everything I learned in my internship ... Being in AI for Business, [career preparation] is built into the curriculum. By being part of the major, you’re saving yourself a lot of time by being on top of everything new that’s happening in the industry.

How did you get involved in the Marshall Artificial Intelligence Association?

FK: There was an opportunity to join this new club called Venture over the summer of my senior year [in high school] to my freshman year [at USC]. There were already people really interested in it.

Once we came to campus, we realized there was no AI business club. So we actually rebranded — instead of being Venture, which was a business entrepreneurship club, we rebranded to Marshall AI Association, or MAIA for short.

It gained a lot more traction because there’s been no club on campus that is purely focused on AI and also as technical. There’s definitely clubs that focus on strategy, but what makes us different is we focus on actual machine learning, applying models, or applying AI to different industries. We get our students to work on those kinds of projects every single semester and also do company partnerships.

What would you say is MAIA’s mission?

FK: Our motto is to empower entrepreneurs with AI. It’s a chance for students to use the current technology that’s always changing and apply it to what they’re interested in. For example, in finance, it could be a credit risk model or a budget categorization model. In entertainment, one of our teams made a product called Robin Cuts, which helped scriptwriters make their scripts much faster by using AI.

People who may not know a lot of technical skills, they can come to our club and they can participate in our technical curriculums. They can learn how to use AI and then apply it into their different industries that they’re interested in. We have entertainment, marketing, finance, biotech, and real estate.

What kinds of companies do you partner with?

FK: Because MAIA’s been launched for two years now, a lot of companies reach out to us to find interns. For example, there’s a startup called Co-Home where they help students own real estate during their four years at college. Essentially you can partition and buy a part of an apartment, actually own it, and then it’ll appreciate, instead of just renting. We were able to partner with them, go through an interview process, and actually give five students internships.

We also had another startup called Stitch AI reach out to us and ask for some interns. All these internships were paid as well, which is a really good opportunity because I know as a freshman or sophomore, it’s hard to get opportunities where you’re actually paid for your work. I really appreciate companies reaching out to us and that we’re able to do this for our students.

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