The first Graduate Marketing Association (GMA) event of the semester kicked off on Feb. 13, 2008 in Van Munching Hall with a presentation from Anthony Pappas, president and creative director of the Pappas Group. Around 40 MBA students and faculty attended the presentation, entitled "The Business of Branding: How Creative Efforts Meet Corporate Goals."

On Feb. 8, 2008, Smith students gathered at both Van Munching Hall and the Samuel Riggs IV Alumni Center for the MBA Consulting Forum. This is the ninth consecutive year that the MBA Consulting Association Executive Board has partnered with faculty, staff and student volunteers to host this daylong interactive event for students, alumni and industry professionals. Students in attendance had the opportunity to interact with consulting professionals from varied backgrounds, levels, firms, and industries both collectively and individually throughout the day.

Every year the MBA Entrepreneurship Club hosts a local round of the Venture Capital Investment Competition (VCIC), whose winner then moves on to a regional competition. This year the local round took place on Feb. 8, 2008 and featured three local startups that are currently in the process of looking for funding—Prepchamps, Inspire and mpowerplayers.

For many undergraduates, winter term is a time to kick back, relax and forget school for a while.

A group of Smith School students from Zurich recently had the opportunity to tackle one of the most pressing problems facing organizations in China today. An outgrowth of China's blistering economic growth has been a challenge in recruiting and retaining skilled workers. Multinational organizations in particular are often caught up in bidding wars where the prevailing attitude among professionals and skilled laborers is that the company offering the biggest paycheck holds their loyalty – at least for the moment.

Undoubtedly the one of the most anticipated events of the Smith MBA program, the annual MBA Case Competition puts strategic thinking and analytical skills of full-time second-year MBA students to the test. The six-day competition started on Friday, Jan. 25 when 20 teams of students received a case about Teva Pharmaceuticals. Students went through three rounds of competition and the final four teams competed for a grand prize of $1,000 per person.

The Part-time MBA Association invited all MBA students, alumni, faculty, and administration to attend "Secrets to C-Level: Leveraging Business Contacts & the Smith Community to Launch Your Career into the Executive Stratosphere on Oct. 28, 2007. The event, held in the Colony Ballroom of the Stamp Student Union, featured the executive vice president and chief information officer from Fannie Mae, Rahul N. Merchant. Merchant has held these positions since November 2006.

A gift from a recent Smith School graduate will ensure the future of the schools Quality Enhancement Systems and Teams (QUEST) Honors Fellows Program annual Innovation and Consulting Conference. QUEST Executive Director J. Gerald Suarez announced the gift at this years conference, held Dec. 6, 2007. The evening event is organized to give students opportunity to present their consulting projects to more than 250 business, nonprofit and government clients; faculty; parents; and peers.

On Friday, Nov. 30, a group of first- and second-year Smith MBA students traveled to the headquarters of the investment firm Calvert in Bethesda, Md., to learn about the Calvert Fund, a socially responsible mutual fund. This field trip dubbed The Calvert Trek was organized by the Smith Net Impact Club, whose mission is to make a positive impact on society by building a community of leaders who use business to improve the world.

On Nov. 13, 2007, Friis Arne Petersen, Denmark's Ambassador to the United States, gave a lecture at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business to an audience of undergraduate students and faculty members. Petersons lecture, titled Denmark in the World Politics, Economy and Energy, centered around Denmark's relationship with the U.S. and its role in the global community.