A team of three students from the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland competed against teams from the nation’s other top 23 business programs at the third annual Nationwide-Fisher Biz Quiz hosted on the campus of the Fisher College of Business at The Ohio State University on Nov. 15, 2008. The final rounds were held at WOSU public television’s production studios at Columbus' Center of Science and Industry (COSI) on Nov. 16.  

More than 250 people packed Van Munching Hall’s Frank Auditorium to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Smith School’s undergraduate Quality Enhancement Systems and Teams (QUEST) Honors Fellows Program and take part in the program’s annual Brumberger Innovation and Consulting Conference, held the evening of Dec. 4, 2008. Named for 2007 alumnus Matthew Brumberger whose financial support sustains conference, the event showcases student consulting projects for corporate and nonprofit clients, faculty, parents and peers. 

Mingfeng Lin, a PhD candidate at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, is studying the value of online social networks and “social commerce” and he has won a handful of awards along the way, including the prestigious Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation Dissertation Fellowship (2009-10).

The Smith School’s new Business Plan Course is not just for entrepreneurs – it’s for everyone. BUSI 691 starting in the spring is a capstone course for the full-time MBA program that offers a great example of how the school is progressively pushing boundaries on the traditional MBA experience.

The months after terrorists used planes to attack the United States on Sept. 11, 2001 marked a low point for the nation’s airlines industry. Most suffered deep losses in profits and had to lay off large numbers of employees. But Southwest Airlines rose above the rest, without reducing its workforce or cutting pay. The company’s success lies in its organizational culture, said former CEO James Parker, in his keynote talk for the daylong Executive Conference on Leading Organizational Change.

The Smith School's Finance Fellows and Women’s Society organized the event, "Finance and the City," to help students of the Robert H. Smith School of Business gain an insight into the strategies necessary for succeeding in the finance sector in the current downturn economy. The primary focus of the event was to provide the industry’s perspective on the job market to the students and help the students understand what would be required of them to stand out in the crowd and succeed in the world of finance amidst today’s unprecedented circumstances. 

Smith’s Logistics, Transportation & Supply Chain Management Society (LTSCM) hosted its annual LTSCM Alumni Night and Industry Day on October 23 and 24, 2008, welcoming dozens of students, faculty, recruiters, and alumni. Approximately 80 company executives, 15 faculty members, and 120 students attended two days of events.

Ashoka, the world's largest network of social entrepreneurs, is launching a pilot program called "Changemaker Campuses" in which Ashoka applies its considerable talents and resources as a catalyst for positive social change to America's university campuses. Ashoka selected the University of Maryland as one of only four campuses across the United States to serve as the pilot program for its campus initiative. The University of Maryland is represented in this initiative by a team of students from across the entire university campus.

On Monday, October 20, 2008, Smith students learned an important lesson about ethics: “Do the right thing, and when you are not sure -- consult.” This was the central message from guest speaker Jeffrey R. Hoops, Ernst & Young’s Ethics and Compliance Officer for the Americas as well as the Chief Privacy Officer. Hoops has worked for Ernst & Young since 1974, and for most of that time advised clients on tax matters. In 2005, he was appointed to his current role, in which he originated the first ethics and compliance program at Ernst & Young.

The Smith School was proud to host the Second Annual Mergers & Acquisitions Competition on Oct. 16 and 17. The event, organized by Smith’s MBA Finance Association, challenged teams of MBA students from leading business schools to create and deliver M&A pitches to a panel of executive judges. Students from the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business won the $5,000 first prize. Purdue University’s Krannert School of Management’s students took the $2,500 second prize, and Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Management’s students won the $1,000 third prize.