Students at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business spent last week exploring global education and career opportunities during International Education Week, Nov.14-18, 2016. International Education Week is a joint initiative of the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of State.

Professor Jeff Miller’s students may have wanted to get “on the road” aboard one of the brand new Harley-Davidson motorcycles they saw in York, Pennsylvania, but they settled for a behind-the-scenes tour of how each cycle is assembled instead. On Wednesday, Nov. 16, 2016, a group of 32 students from the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business took their learning outside of College Park and spent one hour walking along the production floor of the Harley-Davidson Vehicle Operations plant, watching from beginning to end, how each cycle is custom built.

On Nov. 11, 2016, specialty masters students at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business participated in a case competition at the Smith School in Van Munching Hall. Sixteen groups—89 students total—presented during this event, which was hosted by the Office of Career Services in collaboration with lead faculty judge Barney Corwin.

Smith School students had the opportunity to take a field trip unlike any other when they visited the Under Armour Distribution Center and Total Distribution Services Inc. (TDSI), a CSX subsidiary, on Oct. 7, 2016. The Supply Chains Management Fellows Program, funded by the Intermodal Association of North America (IANA), made the tour possible for students. The program allows students to go on tours to get an authentic experience of day-to-day life in a corporation.

A team of MBA students from the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business outperformed finalists from Northwestern, Georgetown and Carnegie Mellon Universities to win the U.S. Chamber Foundation’s inaugural MBA Case Competition on Nov. 3, 2016, in Washington, D.C. “Congratulations to the Smith School team for its first place finish in our inaugural MBA Case Competition,” said foundation president Carolyn Cawley. “At the Foundation we believe that business is part of the solution, so it was rewarding to see the team bring that to life.”

It is sometimes said that you cannot truly know another culture without knowing its language. In fact, culture informs the business environment of every country and knowledge of a foreign language is among the most immediately recognizable signs of a global mindset. According to a 2014 survey conducted by the Centers for International Business Education and Research (CIBERs), 90 percent of employers in the U.S. consider language skills to be important to the international experience of their staff. 

Post-Olympics Brazil faces challenges, but panelists were cautiously optimistic about the country’s future during a Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER) forum on Nov. 1, 2016, at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business.

The Robert H. Smith School of Business held its second Sustainability Lunch and Learn session on Thursday, Oct. 20, giving MBA students the opportunity to engage with Maureen Johnson, Global Internal Sustainability Manager at Deloitte. The session was hosted by the Center for Social Value Creation.

Speed dating took on a new meaning for undergraduates studying finance at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business last week. For several hours on Oct. 26, 2016, more than 130 students mixed and mingled with almost 40 professional mentors from the field of finance at the annual Finance Fellows Networking Night. Several of the mentors were Smith alumni who returned to College Park representing firms such as Capital One, Northwestern Mutual, Deloitte, Harborside Group, and SECU, to name just a few.

Companies worried about disruption need science and technology to stay relevant in the 21st century, but speakers at the fifth annual Smith School Business Summit pointed to soft skills as the real competitive advantage. “If you get leadership, management and culture right, everything else takes care of itself,” keynote speaker David Williams told an audience of more than 300 faculty, staff, students and working professionals gathered Oct.