College of Business Administration 

CAL POLY POMONA 

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 Summer 2014    

   

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Next week, we'll welcome six new faculty members and more than 4,500 undergrad and grad students onto campus as we begin the start of another school year. The 2014-15 year will be memorable as we say goodbye to President Michael Ortiz in December and welcome our new president, Soraya Coley, in the new year. Please keep in touch with the College of Business Administration and Cal Poly Pomona as we will certainly want alumni to participate in these historic events. We also will be announcing the distinguished speakers for 2014-15 Leadership Forum in the near future. Last school year, Daymond John, Sharon Allen and Sir Ken Robinson visited Cal Poly Pomona and the next group of speakers looks to be just as impressive. We hope you can find the time to join us as all Leadership Forum events are free and offered mostly in the evening to accommodate working professionals.

Another important milestone approaching this school year is our re-accreditation from AACSB -International, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business. Receiving AACSB accreditation is the gold standard for business schools, something that less than 5 percent of business schools worldwide have been able to achieve. A team of business school leaders from throughout the country will visit our campus early next year and I look forward to showing them how we have improved as a college.

Sincerely,
Richard S. Lapidus
Dean, College of Business Administration

COLLEGE NEWS 

  


A $500,000 donation that honors the legacy of a Cal Poly Pomona alumnus will transform hands-on learning opportunities and diversity initiatives for students studying information technology in the College of Business Administration.

With the gift, Avanade, a global business technology solutions and managed services provider, has given seed money to establish the Mitchell C. Hill Memorial Endowment, named after its former CEO. The donation will create a new academic center for applied business information technology, which will oversee several projects including a student-managed cloud computing data center, faculty research and student scholarships as well as outreach efforts to women and other underrepresented groups.




Cal Poly Pomona has been named a National Center of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance/Cyber Defense education, an honor that the university has received for the past nine years.

Since its initial designation, the university has quickly become a leader in cybersecurity education, earning the respect of government officials, industry leaders and national news media. Notable achievements include working with other colleges to generate $4.4 million in National Science Foundation grants as well as raising $750,000 in private donations to directly fund Cal Poly Pomona projects. The university also mentors more than 1,000 Los Angeles Unified School District students and has become a top destination for recruiters seeking talented cybersecurity graduates.

   

   


 

 

ALUMNI NEWS

    

 

A Legacy of Helping Others 

 

 

Larry Taff ('80, accounting) has spent his 34-year career climbing the corporate ladder to become a C-suite executive with Arthur Andersen and The Shidler Group.

Yet for Taff, being successful also means improving other people's lives.

In college, that meant helping his friend and roommate Mitchell Hill ('80, economics) become focused on his studies and land a job with Arthur Andersen. Later in life, it meant serving as a mentor for more than a decade with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America and paying full tuition for select Cal Poly Pomona business majors through his scholarship fund.

Now, a $5.3-million bequest from Taff and his wife, Kheng See Ang, will ensure that his penchant for bettering people's lives continues at Cal Poly Pomona.

 

Read more
 

STUDENT SPOTLIGHT

Honoring Our Diverse Student Body 

Dean's Speech -- College of Business Administration Commencement 2014

For every valedictorian who is honored for high grades or athlete who breaks school records, there are thousands more who quietly overcome odds to become college graduates. Realizing that all aspects of our diverse student body should
need to be honored at Commencement, Dean Richard Lapidus began a new tradition in 2010. Each year, he selects three stories from the graduating class with the aim to inspire others to have resilience, hope and inner strength. 

This year's speech featured:  

Geraldine Reyes: She immigrated with her mother to this country from Colombia hoping to find new opportunities and live the American Dream. Their life, however, was anything but picturesque. Her mother was unable to find a well-paid job and Geraldine struggled in school. Hoping to give her better opportunities, her mother decided to make Geraldine a ward of the court. That decision did not make Geraldine's life easier but with the help of loved ones and Cal Poly Pomona's Renaissance Scholars program, she graduated with a business degree and a nearly 3.0 GPA.  

Allan Teter: He didn't care for school when he was was a teenager in the 1970s and decided to work in construction and trucking after graduation. By chance, he began taking classes at a community college and learned that his earlier struggles with school were caused by dyslexia. Once he figured out new ways of learning, he became a standout student who graduated from Cal Poly Pomona with honors. 

Jia Lie Wu: She took Cal Poly Pomona's business calculus class knowing that she flunked the subject in high school. Thanks to the university's Educational Opportunity Program, she was assigned a mentor and tutor who helped her overcome her fears and struggles. She received an A in her class and took additional, non-required math courses. A subject she once hated became her favorite field of study, prompting her to focus on a career in finance and pursue a master's degree in financial engineering. 
 

IN THE NEWS  


"I just like working with security and figuring things out. You are challenged to do different tasks and the technology is constantly changing."  -- 2014 Computer Information Systems alumnus Edward Chua talked with San Gabriel Valley Tribune  on how he secured a job before graduation. Chua is a security consultant for PricewaterhouseCoopers.    

  

"The willingness to think outside the box increases when you work with diverse teams."  --  Computer Information Systems Professor Dan Manson was quoted in a Los Angeles Times story about encouraging middle and high school girls to study cybersecurity. 

 

"It's a strange market. We know that if you put a home on the market it most likely will sell. So why aren't there more homes on the market? Maybe there aren't that many people who want to sell." --  Finance, Real Estate and Law Professor Michael Carney told the Los Angeles Daily News  about the Southern California housing market. Home sales are at a four-year low yet the prices are at a post-recession high.