Letter from Sr. Margaret (university president)

A letter from Sister Margaret:

"Dear Students,

I am proud and pleased to report that we have surpassed our goal of the 150th Anniversary Campaign, raising more than $95 million for scholarships, faculty and staff development, and a range of academic and co-curricular programs.

More than 20,000 donors, including nearly 50 percent of our alumni base, demonstrated their faith in the University and the work we do by contributing to the Campaign and enabling us to ...

* Create 100 new scholarships
* Construct four buildings and three sports facilities
* Garner 20 million-dollar commitments
* Expand academic and co-curricular programs
* Enhance technology
* Renovate facilities"

SIFE's Microloan project in Uganda: Seed capital

Call it a microfinance program or seed capital, it is great to see the success of SIFE's micro loan project in Uganda.

Lindsay’s Blog:

"Teddy was in our first group of ten loan recipients from last May. She got a 300,000 UGS loan (about $150) to for her business in Bethlehem selling pancakes. She had eight months to pay back her loan in two installments.

Today (May 25th) we had an opportunity to meet with all of the trading loan recipients from last year (May loans, November loans and April loans). Teddy told us of her experience and we were blown away!

She used her loan to buy supplies for her pancakes in bulk at a discounted rate (cassava flour, bananas and cooking oil.) The market for her pancakes is very good in Bethlehem and she has little competition. In addition, her pancakes are very good (we tried them!) With her early profits from selling pancakes she was able to buy a pregnant she-goat who soon had two kids. Then she used her next profits from the pancakes to buy 3 hens and 1 cock"

New MBA Class!

Behavioral Finance

The School of Business is excited to offer a new MBA class. Behavioral Finance!

Joining the likes of NYU, Penn, Harvard, MIT, and many others, SBU will now have a class that introduces student to the exciting world of traditional finance and psychology.

What is behavioral finance? See this video from a class at Yale for a taste:




Contact Jim Mahar or Jeff Peterson for more information.

New SBU video

Here is a new (12 minute) video on the 150th Anniversary Fund Raising campaign.

From SBU News

Newsmakers for Summer 2009:

"Mark Wilson, Ph.D., assistant professor of economics, and Rodney Paul, Ph.D., associate professor of economics, had the paper “Testing Market Efficiency and Bettor Biases in the Baseball Totals Market” published in the most recent issue of the Journal of Business, Industry, and Economics."

EmbraceItAfrica Trip updates

Andrew Mantilla (2008 BBA, 2009 MBA) is part of the SBU-SIFE sponsored trip to Africa (See EmbraceitAFrica.org). He has kept a blog of their journey. Highly recommended!

Andrew's Blog: Last Days in Uganda:

"It was hard to see this other side of Africa where there is development, tourism, somewhat of a regular economy, and money. Our time at Bethlehem and Kyotera was full of intense culture and poverty where we were the only white people anywhere in site. It was hard to see the struggle that most of the people in this country have to go through and then just around the corner there are people with money.

I'm really going to miss the school as it was an experience that has changed the way I look and feel about things forever."

The rest of his blog is here. Some of the Africa Related posts are

• Last Days in Uganda
• Visiting Homes
• Teachers Gift from HSBC and Ugandan Homes
• Loans, School and More Uganda
• First Visit to the School, Driving, and Loan Meeti...
• First Full Day
• Arrival to Uganda
• Getting Ready To Leave
• Lindsay's Blog: Summary of Plans for 2009 Trip

BonaSIMM

Not too bad considering the market's performance! The portfolio is entirely student led. They make all investment decisions.

BonaSIMM:

"As of the end of trading on June 4th the E-Trade account is valued at $44,300 and the Bank of New York Mellon account is valued at $102,073. Giving the SIMM portfolio a total value of $146,373."

As an aside, the class still has some openings for the fall semester. Also students can take the class twice (Finance 410 and Finance 411) as an undergrad. Graduate students can also take it as a MBA student. Finally, students can take the class not for credit as a "club".

Ernst & Young donation pushes total for year to almost $20,000

Ernst & Young donation pushes total for year to almost $20,000:

"St. Bonaventure University has received a gift of $9,650 from Ernst &Young as part of the accounting firm's matching-gifts program.


The contribution brings the total contributed this year to St. Bonaventure by the firm and its staff members to $19,300."