Univ. of Maryland’s Smith School of Business and Maryland Bankers Association to Offer Program for Community Bank Board Members

Univ. of Maryland’s Smith School of Business and Maryland Bankers Association to Offer Program for Community Bank Board Members

College Park, Md. – December 7, 2010 – The Center for Financial Policy at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business and the Maryland Bankers Association are partnering to deliver a Bank Director Training Program. Targeted to business leaders who serve on the boards of community banks in Maryland, the series of short courses will lead participants through new regulations in the wake of the financial crisis and leverage Smith’s world-class faculty and research from the Center for Financial Policy.

Courses will give board members the financial skills and understanding to work more effectively with their banks and better navigate complex decisions, even though many are not professionals in the industry. The program will be offered in six, four-hour modules, beginning in January 2011. The Smith School’s finance faculty, in conjunction with the Office of Executive Programs, will teach the courses at the school’s College Park, Md. campus, with one module to be held in June in conjunction with the Maryland Bankers Association annual meeting.

“As we’re emerging from the financial crisis, there is no better time for a formal program for community bank board members,” said Clifford Rossi, executive-in-residence at the Center for Financial Policy and academic director of the Board Director Training Program. “Having board directors who understand the new state and federal regulatory reforms is critical to the ongoing stability of the banking sector in Maryland.”

Rossi, a 25-year banking industry veteran, will teach the first course on credit risk management in January 2011. Rossi will bring his experience as chief risk officer, most recently with Citigroup, to give board members an overview of credit risks faced by banks, what to look for and how banks can better control these exposures. Subsequent courses will cover asset liability, deposit insurance, capital management, corporate governance and strategic planning.

“We are excited to be partnering with the Smith School on this program,” said Kathleen Murphy, president and CEO of the Maryland Bankers Association. “With more than 700 business leaders currently serving on the boards of Maryland’s community banks, this program will provide an ongoing resource with some of the premier educational financial faculty in the country. This will be a wonderful added benefit for our members.”

Launched in 2009, the Center for Financial Policy offers an unbiased source of expertise on complex policy issues related to financial institutions, financial markets and public companies through cutting-edge research, outreach and executive education. Center leaders interact with policymakers to provide impartial help in steering and influencing policy, and provide thought leadership to industry executives in the public and private sectors. The center also offers the Directors’ Institute, an intensive, three-day program for corporate board members held in April in Washington.

The Smith School is widely recognized as a world-leading source of business management education and research, consistently ranking among the world’s best for faculty research. It was recently ranked No. 15 in the United States for its executive MBA program and No. 1 in corporate strategy by the Financial Times.

About the Maryland Bankers Association
Founded in 1896, MBA’s member banks have more than 25,000 employees and hold
97 percent of the FDIC insured deposits in Maryland in more than 1,800 branch offices. MBA serves member banks and thrifts as a legislative and regulatory advocate at all levels of government, as the public relations voice for the industry, as a provider of professional education to members and a promoter of consumer financial education to adults and students.   

About the Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, MS in business, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

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Univ. of Maryland’s Smith School of Business EMBA Program Ranks No. 15 in the U.S.

Univ. of Maryland’s Smith School of Business
EMBA Program Ranks No. 15 in the U.S.

Financial Times Executive Education Ranking Places Smith School No. 1 in Corporate Strategy Worldwide; No. 9 for Faculty Research, Entrepreneurship

College Park, Md. – October 25, 2010 – The executive MBA program at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business is ranked No. 15 in the United States and No. 36 in world, according to the 2010 Financial Times executive education rankings published today. The influential rankings place the Smith School's EMBA No. 1 in the world for corporate strategy and No. 9 globally for entrepreneurship and for faculty research, an area of strength for which the school is consistently recognized as a leader.

“We are proud to be the No. 1 program in the world for corporate strategy – a recognition we’ve worked hard to achieve since starting our EMBA program less than 10 years ago,” said G. “Anand” Anandalingam, dean of the Robert H. Smith School of Business. “We are the highest ranked program in the Baltimore-Washington region, following a previous great ranking by the Wall Street Journal. This ranking is a testament to the strength of our faculty and the real-world leadership development and applied research they bring into the classroom. With our emphasis on action learning and entrepreneurial problem solving, our students emerge as leaders and innovators in their organizations.”

Smith’s EMBA program was ranked No. 22 in the world by the Wall Street Journal in September 2010, which also ranked Smith No. 15 for how well it imparts management skills to students and No. 16 according to alumni rating. In addition to the EMBA degree program, Smith’s top faculty share their expertise through the school’s several non-degree programs. Executives can take part in the recently launched miniMBA2.0 certificate program, which emphasizes practical skills development and professional networking for the increasingly technology- and analysis-focused business environment.

The Financial Times rankings are compiled from two questionnaires – one that focuses on business school and program information, the other that focuses on alumni achievement three years after graduation for the EMBA class of 2007. The corporate strategy and entrepreneurship program rankings are based on the alumni survey. The research ranking is calculated according to the number of faculty publications in 45 international academic and practitioner journals. Points are accrued by the business school at which the author is currently employed and the total is weighted for faculty size. 

About the Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, MS in business, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

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University of Maryland’s Center for Social Value Creation Expands Grassroots.org Social Venture Consulting Program to MBA Students Nationwide

University of Maryland’s Center for Social Value Creation
Expands Grassroots.org Social Venture Consulting Program
to MBA Students Nationwide

College Park, Md. – January 10, 2011 — The Center for Social Value Creation at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business is expanding its Grassroots.org Social Venture Consulting Program in partnership with Grassroots.org, an organization that provides free technologies and resources to nonprofits. The innovative experiential learning program matches MBA students with nonprofit organizations around the country for semester-long consulting projects. Make Change! Trust provided a $120,000 grant to expand the program and the Center for Social Value Creation is inviting students nationwide to participate.

Since 2006, the competitive program has served more than 75 organizations and involved nearly 300 students, providing MBAs with practical consulting experience and the opportunity to give back to their community. Make Change! Trust has supported the program since its inception.

“This program provides a valuable service to nonprofits around the country and gives our students the hands-on experience coming up with innovative solutions to solving social issues,” said G. “Anand” Anandalingam, dean of the Robert H. Smith School of Business. “This type of experiential learning is what all MBA students need to develop as the next generation of leaders. We’re happy we can help provide this beyond Smith to students around the nation.”

The consulting projects range from creating marketing campaigns, to designing donor outreach, to building financial models. U.S. nonprofits served by Grassroots.org apply to the program each semester to receive the consulting work from MBA student teams at no charge. Currently, the popular program can only serve about 10 percent of nonprofits that apply, but Make Change! Trust hopes that number will increase with the expansion of the program. The trust and the Center for Social Value Creation share the goal to provide more nonprofit organizations with mission-critical project work while providing a skills-based volunteer opportunity to more MBAs across the country.

“We are thrilled to be able to provide a greater number of nonprofits with capacity-building expertise,” said Melissa Carrier, executive director of the Center for Social Value Creation. “We’ve had tremendous success with our students and this program and we’re excited to replicate that success with MBAs at other schools.”

Smith’s Center for Social Value Creation and Grassroots.org will support other business schools that apply to take part in the program with a database of projects to match with student consulting groups, templates for successful outcomes, and a knowledge toolkit. The center will also provide ongoing advising to participants, much in the way center staff and faculty currently advise Smith student teams. Each consulting project is managed and completed by a group of three to five students.

The Grassroots.org Social Venture Consulting Program fulfills one of the main missions of the Center for Social Value Creation, which was launched in September 2009 to engage students in courses and experiential learning programs to enable them to become global leaders who understand how to use business as a vehicle for both economic prosperity and transformative social change. The center also supports faculty research in related areas.

About the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, executive MS, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

About Grassroots.org
Grassroots.org serves as a catalyst for positive social change by leveraging modern technologies and best business practices. Grassroots.org provides nonprofit organizations with free valuable technologies and resources to increase their efficiency and productivity. Grassroots.org’s goal is to adopt 10,000 nonprofit members, and to provide each of them with an average of $10,000 per year worth of services at no charge (for a total savings of $100 million per year!). Today Grassroots.org offers nonprofits free technology and business services available through its “Nonprofit Toolbox” and currently serves more than 3,500 nonprofits worldwide!

About Make Change! Trust
Make Change! Trust is a charitable fund developed by Internet entrepreneurs and philanthropists devoted to using technology to improve the world. MC!T makes donations to nonprofit organizations that are empowering other nonprofits and the underserved through innovative uses of technology. MC!T has donated more than a million of dollar to technology-focused organizations serving others, and directly to nonprofits fighting disease, homelessness, poverty, and supporting other humanitarian causes.

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University of Maryland’s Center for Social Value Creation Names Board of Advisors

University of Maryland’s Center for Social Value Creation Names Board of Advisors

College Park, Md. – September 6, 2011 — The Center for Social Value Creation at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business named six prominent business leaders to form its advisory board. The center launched in September 2009 with a mission to create and educate global leaders to use business as a vehicle for social and environmental change. Board members will meet bi-annually and help guide the center’s strategic functions and its outreach with businesses, nonprofits and the public sector.

Center for Social Value Creation board members are:

Stanley Litow (Chair), Vice President, Citizenship & Corporate Affairs and President, IBM International FoundationJohn Chickering, Vice President, Fidelity InvestmentsLisa Hall, President and CEO, the Calvert FoundationRobert Kashan, Founder and CEO, EarthColor Inc., an environmentally friendly and sustainable printing company based in New JerseyAlan Webber, Co-Founder, Fast Company and former managing editor and editorial director of the Harvard Business ReviewDennis Wraase, Former CEO and Chairman, Pepco Holdings

“We are fortunate to have recruited such a great group of visionaries in corporate social responsibility and sustainability,” said Melissa Carrier, executive director of the Center for Social Value Creation. “These leaders are at the top of their fields and set a great example for our students. They exemplify our mission to use business skills to bring about transformative social change in the world and they’ll help propel the center forward.”

With their extensive professional experience and networks, board members will help build support and advocate for the center by helping to spread the word on its mission and activities to potential partners and donors. Members will provide counsel on key strategies and initiatives. They will help with fundraising and identifying career opportunities and internships for Smith students. Board members will also participate in center events as speakers and panelists, or by helping to recruit other high-profile presenters.

Board members will serve a renewable two-year term.

The Smith School is well-situated to take a leadership role in social value creation business education given its internationally recognized faculty; its extensive relationships with key practitioners, academics, and policymakers, and its proximity to Washington, D.C. Through the Center for Social Value Creation, Smith students have the opportunity to engage in real-world field experiences such as consulting with nonprofits or traveling abroad to work on sustainable projects in developing countries. The center also works with the school’s academic departments on courses at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. The center also supports faculty research in related areas.

More information about the Center for Social Value Creation is available at http://www.rhsmith.umd.edu/svc/

About the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, executive MS, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

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University of Maryland’s Cupid’s Cup Business & Innovation Showcase Leads to $1.5M Investment for Local Startup

University of Maryland’s Cupid’s Cup Business & Innovation Showcase Leads to $1.5M Investment for Local Startup

l-r: Jerrold Prothero, CEO and founder of Astrapi Corporation;
Elana Fine, managing director of the Dingman Center;
and Bill Boyle, Dingman Center angel investor

College Park, Md. – July 1, 2013 – Astrapi Corporation, whose patented signal modulation technology will revolutionize the mobile communications industry, has closed a seed round totaling $1.5 million led by Dingman Center Angel investor, Bill Boyle. The funding will be used to develop a commercially viable product for deployment with initial customers.

Boyle recognized the disruptive technology through a chance meeting at the April 2013 University of Maryland’s Cupid’s Cup Business and Innovation Showcase hosted by the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship at the Robert H. Smith School of Business. The showcase featured campus and regional startups, including Astrapi, and was attended by the regional entrepreneurship and investor community.

“I was in the fiber services industry for the last 20 years and while walking around the Cupid’s Cup showcase I noticed a telecommunications startup,” said Boyle. “Astrapi claimed their technology could transmit dramatically more information than can be currently transmitted by using a different type of wireless signal based on spirals rather than the traditional circles. I was immediately drawn in and I quickly came to the conclusion that this technology is a game changer in an area that needs one.”

Astrapi’s spiral-based signal modulation improves spectral efficiency compared to the current industry standard by providing new ways to transmit information. These improvements alter how telecommunication networks send and receive signals, increasing the value of spectrum, and enabling operators to meet exploding demand more economically. The initial target markets are wireless mobile backhaul providers and satellite enterprise networks due to their constrained signal power, high data throughput requirements, and limited standards applicability.

On June 25, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued Astrapi’s first patent, entitled "Telecommunications signaling using nonlinear functions." The patent is credited to inventor, Jerrold Prothero, Ph.D., CEO and founder of Astrapi, and covers the broad concept of using complex spirals for signal modulation in telecommunications.

“Our technology is based on showing for the first time how to effectively use bandlimited, non-periodic waveforms as the basis of communication,” said Prothero. "This allows us to do things that were previously thought to be impossible, by extending the mathematics and engineering principles that underlie telecommunications.”

Connections like the one between Astrapi and Boyle are exactly what the Dingman Center hopes to achieve through Cupid’s Cup. This signature event is sponsored by Under Armour founder and CEO, Kevin Plank and has evolved from a campus competition awarding only UMD student startups to a national one. The national expansion has allowed the Dingman Center to increase the number exhibitors, which this year included Astrapi Corporation.

“The genesis of this deal illustrates the depth and breadth of our network,” said Elana Fine, managing director of the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship. “This connection between Bill Boyle and Astrapi is a perfect example of the Dingman community at work. Because of our expansion we are pulling in technologies and startups from across campus and throughout the region so I think we’ll continue to have success stories like this one.”

Boyle, a UMD alumnus, is founder and former president of Fibergate, a Washington, D.C. metro area provider of fiber-optic communication services. He is a member of the Dingman Center Angels, one of the area’s most active networks that connects startups seeking seed and early-stage funding with angel investors.

Boyle, and his fellow Astrapi investor, recently completed a successful exit from Fibergate and are both helping to guide Astrapi to a successful product launch. Currently, Astrapi is in commercialization talks with its first customer.

"We believe this technology will change the communications landscape forever and we look forward to its rapid deployment,” said Boyle.

Astrapi is a member of Mtech’s TAP Incubator located on the UMD campus. TAP offers furnished offices and flexible lab space as well as a multitude of other benefits and services.

About Astrapi Corporation
Astrapi is a spiral-based signal modulation company with patented IP. By applying new mathematics to signal modulation, Astrapi is able to improve the trade-off between the four fundamental parameters in telecommunication: bandwidth, signal power, data throughput, and error rate. Based on foundational work by its founder, Dr. Jerold Prothero, the company's patented Compound Channel Coding™ (cCc™) technology allows for dramatic improvements in communication performance by smoothly integrating periodic and exponential signal parameters. For network owners, operators and end-users, the resulting efficiency translates into higher spectral performance with more bits available at a lower cost.

About the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship
The Dingman Center is one of the nation’s pre-eminent institutions where the research, education and practice of entrepreneurship are pursued vigorously. We develop and execute curricular and non-curricular programs that uniquely leverage Smith School thought leadership, experiential learning and our network of practitioners to provide resources to startup businesses. Every initiative is designed to support the Center’s mission to build a community, operating from the Smith School that discovers, equips, connects and celebrates entrepreneurs.

About Mtech
The mission of Mtech is to educate the next generation of technology entrepreneurs, create successful technology ventures, and connect Maryland companies with university resources to help them succeed. Founded in 1983, Mtech has had a $29.4 billion impact on the Maryland economy and helped create or retain more than 7,800 jobs. Billion dollar companies such as Martek Biosciences and Digene Corporation graduated from our incubator. Mtech offers three experiential learning programs and 18 entrepreneurship and innovation courses, served to 1,003 enrollees in the academic year 2011-12, at the pre-college, undergraduate and graduate levels.

About the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, online MBA, MS in business, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

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University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business Launches Online MBA Program

University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business Launches
Online MBA Program

College Park, Md. – June 17, 2013 – The Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland will offer an online MBA program beginning in January 2014. Designed to accommodate working professionals, the flexible online program allows students to earn an MBA degree largely on their own time with minimal on-campus requirements. The program courses are taught by the same top faculty and adhere to the academic rigor of the Smith School’s other top MBA programs.

“This is a major step forward for the university and for business professionals who need flexible access to academic excellence,” said UMD President Wallace Loh. “The Smith School is combining a state-of-the-art online platform with the academic rigor that makes it a leader. University-wide we are exploring how best to use technology-based learning, and this is an excellent model.”

The Smith Online MBA is modeled after the school’s top-ranked and highly successful executive MBA program, but it is delivered primarily online. Students begin and end the program with structured, in-person residencies at the University of Maryland’s campus in College Park. The remainder of the program is completed online. Students can earn their MBA degree in 21 months.

The online MBA program offers a broad base of knowledge on a wide range of business concepts, such as entrepreneurship, managerial economics, information systems and global economic development to prepare students with a strong business background. Students select one of four specializations — accounting, information systems and analytics, finance or marketing – to focus on their own particular area of interest or they may choose the general track, which allows course selection in each of the areas.

Courses will include two “live,” approximately hour-long sessions per week, where students will log on at a specific time to interact with faculty and fellow students. Other coursework can be completed at times that work best for each student.

The program is fully accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, AACSB International, the premier accrediting agency for bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree programs in business administration and accounting. GMAT or GRE entrance exams will be required for admission.
“Different educational formats work best for different kinds of learners – this program is best for working professionals who can learn within a rigorous, structured program, but more-so on their own time,” said G. “Anand” Anandalingam, dean of the Robert H. Smith School of Business. “The elements that make our MBA degree programs so successful will still be in place with this program, but the key difference will be the level of flexibility.”

The Smith School’s MBA curriculum is focused on experiential learning opportunities for students and the online MBA program will also offer these experiences. Students will work together in groups on action learning projects, using knowledge gained in courses to tackle a real challenge or opportunity faced in a team member’s organization. Students will self-select teams, conduct remote project meetings and deliver presentations virtually.

These team projects and online group discussions give students many opportunities to create relationships with business professionals in the program across the nation and the world. The two residencies also provide the chance to establish strong professional connections with peers and professors.

For more information about the curriculum or the program requirements or to apply, go to www.rhsmith.umd.edu/onlinemba or contact a school representative at 1-877-807-8741.

About the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business
The Robert H. Smith School of Business is an internationally recognized leader in management education and research. One of 12 colleges and schools at the University of Maryland, College Park, the Smith School offers undergraduate, full-time and part-time MBA, executive MBA, executive MS, PhD and executive education programs, as well as outreach services to the corporate community. The school offers its degree, custom and certification programs in learning locations in North America and Asia.

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