Class of 2007 Reflects on McCombs Experience and Shares Future Plans
This year, hundreds of students from the Class of 2007  graduated from McCombs with BBA, MPA, MBA or Ph.D. degrees. Here are stories of some of those graduates, including Jasmine Liang (right), as they begin the journey toward becoming leaders in the business world. Read the Profiles.

Three Faculty Members Earn Title of Senior Distinguished Lecturer
As of Sept. 1, 2007, Rick Byars of the Department of IROM and Bob Duvic (left) and Jim Nolen of the Department of Finance will be promoted to the rank of distinguished senior lecturer, which is a new level of recognition for faculty at the university. Congratulations to all on this well-deserved promotion.

McCombs School of Business Teaching and Research Awards 2006-2007
The following McCombs faculty were honored at a luncheon May 10 for their teaching and research excellence: Raj Raghunathan, marketing, CBA Foundation Research Excellence Award for Assistant Professors; Kyle Lewis (top right), management, and Bob Parrino, finance, Award for Research Excellence; George Huber (bottom right), management, Career Award for Outstanding Research Contributions; Jim Fredrickson, management, Joe D. Beasley MBA Teaching Award; Frenkel Ter Hofstede, marketing, Hank & Mary Harkins Foundation Award for Effective Teaching in Undergraduate Classes; Lorenzo Garlappi, finance, Trammell/CBA Foundation Teaching Award for Assistant Professors; Gaylen Paulson, management, Fawn & Vijay Mahajan Teaching Excellence Award for Executive Education; and Keith Brown, finance, Excellence in Education Award. The following Ph.D. students also won teaching awards and were honored at the same luncheon: Joseph Goodman, marketing, and Michael Crawley, accounting, Fred Moore Assistant Instructor Awards for Teaching Excellence.

Business Honors Names Award Winners in Class of 2007
The Business Honors Program (BHP) recently announced its Outstanding Student and Doenges Award recipients. The Outstanding Student Awards are given to four seniors, and the Doenges Award is given to the top student. Outstanding Students Award winners are: Elizabeth Alderton, Stephanie Bula, Sarina Hickey and Pegah Javidpour. The Doenges Award winner is Marialena Rivera. Congratulations to all on their outstanding achievements at McCombs.

McCOMBS IN THE NEWS
How Can Public Business Schools Compete with Private Schools?
BusinessWeek Online, April 30, 2007
Many state business schools are having a tough time competing for top talent with their private rivals. At the McCombs School, Dean George Gau (right) has succeeded by putting an added focus on for-profit endeavors, most notably, non-degree executive education. When Gau became dean at McCombs in 2002, 15 percent of the school’s budget came from the Texas Executive Education’s open enrollment programs. Today, that figure has doubled to 30 percent. “A big chunk of my faculty’s salaries is being paid by the customers of executive education,” Gau said.
Get the full story.

Tetlock Op-Ed: When Gambling is Good
The Wall Street Journal, May 11, 2007
Assistant Finance Professor Paul Tetlock co-authored an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal in which he examines the value of information markets. Excerpt: “Imagine the president had a crystal ball to predict more accurately the impact of broader prescription coverage on the Medicare budget, the effect of more frequent audits on tax compliance—or even the consequences of a political settlement in Iraq on oil prices. Now, stop imagining: Such crystal balls are within our grasp. But they can’t be used without running a gauntlet of federal and state regulation. The crystal balls are called prediction markets or information markets, and they help forecasters, for example by allowing traders to vote with their money on the future unemployment rate or the winner of the next presidential race.”
Get the full story.

Auditing Rule is Put at Risk by Texas Bill
The New York Times, May 18, 2007
Texas lawmakers are on the verge of rejecting a requirement that state and local governments disclose the cost of the healthcare they have promised to retired employees. Until now, most governments have been using pay-as-you-go accounting, which does not show the benefits’ total cost. This method shows only how much a government spends each year to buy health care for its retirees—not the value of the benefits coming due in the future. “Politicians don’t want to deal with the problem,” said Michael Granof, McCombs accounting professor. Granof said state lawmakers were betting that by the time rising health care costs became unmanageable, they would no longer be in office and could not be held accountable. Get the full story (subscription is required).

McCombs Alumni Make Up Half Female and Minority CEOs in DFW
Dallas Morning News, May 13, 2007
A recent study by the Dallas Morning News found that among CEOs at the 100 largest public and private companies in Dallas and Fort Worth, only three are women and just one is a member of a minority group. Two of those CEOs are McCombs School graduates: Kathy Harless, BBA ’72 and chief executive of Idearc, Inc.—the spinoff from Verizon Communications—and Carlos Sepulveda, BBA ’79 and CEO of Interstate Battery System International, Inc. Harless and Sepulveda discussed the barriers that keep women and minorities from reaching top executives positions as well as the keys to their own success. Get the full story.

BBA Student Appears on CNBC
CNBC, May 15, 2007
Mark Tait, BBA ’07, appeared on CNBC’s Fast Money program in a segment called “Face 2 Face.” Tait questioned the show’s hosts about buying stock in Posco, the world’s third-largest steelmaker.
Watch the segment (registration is required).