University of Arkansas at Little Rock

Dr. Gaurav Kumar, assistant professor of accounting, has won the 2012 Arkansas Society of CPAs’ Distinguished Achievement in Accounting Education Award.

Kumar’s research areas are financial and international accounting. He started his research in the international accounting area during his Ph.D. program. His dissertation examined the voluntary disclosures by U.S.-listed Asian companies and was published in a highly regarded peer-reviewed journal. and has been published as a book.

In other College of Business news, Will Elliott , director of the executive MBA program and director of external relations, was elected chair of the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce’s “Create Little Rock” Development Committee.

John Hendon, instructor in the Department of Management, has had his textbook, “Human Resource Management: Functions, Applications and Skill Development” published by Sage Publications in January.

Dr. Robert Oliva, chair of the Department of Accounting, had had his “Collecting Costs and Attorney’s Fees from the IRS: The Section 7430 Labyrinth,” was cover article in the December 2011 issue of “Warren, Gorham, and Lamont’s Practical Tax Strategies.”

Kayla New will receive her MBA at UALR’s commencement Dec. 15, but she has already been putting her business degrees to work advancing her life’s passions.

The 24-year-old from Dover, Ark., is the newest – and youngest ever – member of the board of the National Cave Research Foundation that facilitates research, management, and interpretation of cave systems.

The avid runner and hiker said she started caving about three and a half years ago.

“I started recreationally and then I started meeting Cave Research Foundation researchers and joined the Little Rock Grotto,” she said. Both groups of spelunkers are on the front lines of mapping caves and documenting the health of cave-dwelling bat populations. Both organizations work with the National Park Service and other agencies fighting the spread of white nose syndrome, a fungus decimating bat populations across the country.

“There’s a strain of a fungus that basically messes with (the bats’) immune system,” New said. “They wake up from hibernation too early and weak. With nothing to eat out there. When a colony is infected, there is about a 100 percent mortality.”

Federal agencies have closed all caves on public land in an attempt to protect bats from the syndrome.

“But we operate under a special research permit with the National Park Service. We provide research in biological monitoring, inventory information, and cave mapping,” New said. “I’ve explored caves 150 deep, and one’s 18 miles long. I’ve done six and a half inch squeezes. Not everyone can fit.”

When she is not squeezing through underground cave passages, New is finishing her MBA and working at the Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center at UALR’s College of Business, working to help small businesses and entrepreneurial ventures get off the ground. She majored in economics and Spanish as an undergraduate at Arkansas Tech University.

“It’s pretty fun work, helping clients with their business plans, doing market research, financial development, and projections,” she said. “I’ve been able to work with a variety of small businesses, from restaurants to variety stores. I’ve had such great work experience even before I get my degree.”

Fluent in Spanish, New recently completed translating ASBTDC’s “To the Point Business Planning Guide” and other agency documents into Spanish.
She has developed skills in Geographic Information Systems – GIS – to help clients make informed decisions by tying consumer spending and market data to specific locations.

“It’s my dream job,” she said. “If they would pay me to survey, I would certainly do it all day long.” She is mostly interested in focusing her talents and skills on the non-profit sector. “I like to help people,” she said.

Meanwhile, she is making her mark at UALR’s nonprofit small business center, where entrepreneurs and small business operators can obtain free advice and service to establish and grow their enterprises.

“Kayla routinely helps business owners evaluate potential business locations by looking at relevant market data for the location,” said ASBTDC Innovation and Market Research Manager Michael Singleton. “She is a whiz at managing complex projects and finding creative solutions to often difficult problems.”

New has used technology similar to what she uses at ASBTDC when she maps caves. The dreaded White Nose Syndrome hasn’t yet affected bat colonies in Arkansas, and New and her spelunker organizations hope it stays that way.

Singleton congratulated the Cave Research Foundation’s decision to appoint New to the organization’s board.

“We can teach business skills and give experience in working in real life business situations, but a student comes with her own attitude,” he said. “The combination of skill and attitude can take a graduate assistant to new heights, or in Kayla’s case, new depths.”

Former UALR men’s golfer Keith Becker has been honored with the Faculty Award for Outstanding Student in the MBA program at the UALR College of Business and is being inducted into the Beta Gamma Sigma honor society, it was recently announced. In addition to Becker, former volleyball player Jennifer Elbert as well as former track athlete and current UALR Director of Sales Sheena Howell are also being inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma.

Becker becomes the recipient of the faculty award after earning a perfect 4.0 cumulative GPA, the highest amongst all UALR MBA students graduating in the Fall 2011 semester.

A member of the men’s golf team from 2006-11, Becker was named to the Sun Belt Conference Commissioner’s List for achieving a GPA of 3.5 or above in each of his years on campus. The San Antonio, Texas, native graduated from UALR in 2010 with a pair of bachelor’s degrees in finance and economics.

Elbert and Howell, two former UALR student-athletes, will also be inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma for their classroom accomplishments.

Beta Gamma Sigma was founded in 1913 to encourage and reward scholarship and accomplishment in the field of business studies. Membership in the organization represents the very top honor a business student can achieve.

The chapter will give formal recognition to this honor at the induction ceremony, which will be held Tuesday, December 13 at 5:30 p.m. in Room 103 of the Reynolds Business Center.

UALR’s College of Business was ranked in the U.S. News and World Report’s 2011 Best Colleges listings for best business programs ─ the first time the college was ranked among the top-tier business schools in the country. It was also the first time UALR was included in the publication.

For the second year in a row, the college was ranked among the Best Undergraduate Business Programs for 2012, and it moved up almost 30 places in the rankings from 2011.

More than 1,400 colleges and programs of business were reviewed for the final rankings by U.S. News. Of those 1,400 business schools and programs, only 386 were awarded national ranks designated in the “Best Business Programs among Colleges and Universities” list. For undergraduate business school rankings, U.S. News surveyed deans and senior faculty at undergraduate business programs accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.

“What is most rewarding is that we are ranked in the top tier. This means that we are ranked among other very prestigious colleges and programs of business in the country,” Dean Anthony Chelte said. “This first national ranking marked a milestone in the development and recognition of the college as we are considered among a very prestigious group of business schools.

“The efforts of the faculty, staff, and supporters of the college have made a substantive impact on the positioning of the college. I am very proud of their efforts as they are the driving force for high quality business education. As the college continues to grow and develop, we expect to work our way up in the national rankings each year.”

Trustees of The Stephen Harrow Smith Revocable Trust announced today a $1.15 million gift to UALR to establish a dean’s endowment and seminar room for the College of Business that will honor the late Little Rock financier.

J. French Hill, chief executive officer of Delta Trust & Bank and a trustee of the Smith Trust, said the gift would establish the Stephen Harrow Smith Endowed Dean of Business and the Stephen Harrow Smith Seminar Room in the College of Business.

“The purpose of the Stephen Harrow Smith Endowed Dean of Business is to honor the memory of Stephen Harrow Smith, recognize his lifetime of exemplary business leadership and his passionate belief in America and its free market economy,” Hill said.

The gift also will provide for the greatest need in the College of Business and may include student scholarship, internships, study abroad, career placement, and competitive support for gifted and talented students and faculty.

The gift also will make possible several enhancements near the newly named Stephen Harrow Smith Seminar Room on the third floor the Donald W. Reynolds Center for Business and Economic Development. Those include an interactive touch screen LCD video wall and full color 12-foot LED stock market ticker along with continued maintenance.

“This gift marks a significant milestone for the College of Business and helps ensure that we will continue to make significant contributions to the growth and viability of our businesses, communities, and state,” said Dr. Anthony F. Chelte, dean of the College of Business.

“The Stephen Harrow Smith Endowment will provide the resources necessary to help achieve the college’s mission to provide high quality business education, serving as a catalyst for economic development across the state of Arkansas, and to continue to provide career-ready, well-prepared, and outstanding students for Arkansas’ business and broader communities.”

After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School with a degree in economics, Smith returned to his hometown of Little Rock in 1933 and began pursuing his main interest, investments. He worked for three small investment companies until World War II broke out and he was stationed at Wilmington, Del., Air Base as administrative officer for the Ferrying Division of the Air Transport Command.

After the war, Smith returned to Little Rock and joined Walter R. Bass Investments until 1957. When Bass died, Smith bought the firm and operated it as Harrow Smith Co. until he retired in 1987.

Smith also served on the boards of the Visiting Nurses Association, the local Red Cross, the Metropolitan YMCA, and the Roselawn Memorial Park Cemetery Board.

UALR’s College of Business has received a gift of $41,550 from Arvest Mortgage Co. to provide the Bloomberg data system that enables financial professionals to monitor and analyze real-time financial market data movements.

Bill Roehrenbeck, chief executive officer of Arvest Mortgage and a UALR business graduate, said the gift will provide students and faculty access to the system’s price quotes, and messaging across its proprietary secure network for three years.

“Arvest Mortgage, under the leadership of CEO Bill Roehrenbeck, has demonstrated its commitment to preparing students to make significant contributions to Arkansas’ businesses,” said Dr. Anthony Chelte, dean of the College of Business. “The recent gift will provide students with direct experience with Bloomberg Terminals and financial analytics that will prepare them to add immediate value to companies like Arvest Mortgage upon graduation.

“The UALR College of Business appreciates Arvest Mortgages’ continuing support and remains committed to providing high quality business education and serving the economic development needs of Central Arkansas and beyond.”

Dr. H. Andy Terry, chair of the Department of Economics and Finance, said Bloomberg is one of the premier data sources for financial institutions and traders.

“The Bloomberg terminals will provide our students access to data that professionals on Wall Street use daily in real time,” he said. “In addition, they are a tremendous source of financial and economic data that should facilitate faculty research.”

Both the dean and the chair said the access to Bloomberg data should provide a real boost to the school’s specific effort to recruit more high-quality economics and finance students.

Dr. Otmar Varela, assistant professor of management, has had three refereed journal publications since joining the faculty last year. His article contributions include “Similarity-Attraction in Training Contexts: An Empirical Study” in Human Resource Development Quarterly, “A general structure of job performance: Evidence from two samples” in the Journal of Business and Psychology, and “The meaning of job performance in collectivistic and high power distance countries” in Cross Cultural Management.

Dr. Clay Posey, assistant professor of management, was interviewed on Federal News Radio in Washington, D.C., regarding his published research on security with the IBM Center for the Business of Government, which was funded in part from a Department of Defense grant. His other manuscript, “Understanding the Mindset of the Abusive Insider: An Examination of Insiders’ Causal Reasoning following Internal Security Changes,” was accepted by Computers & Security.

Dr. Rolf Wigand, professor of information science, co-authored an article, “Reconsidering Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization (MISMO) for Commercial Mortgage Industry,” that appeared in the May Mortgage Banking magazine.

The College of Business has had a visiting professor, Dr. Moo Hong Kang from Korea, for the past year. Dr. Sung-kwan Kim, associate professor of management, and Dr. Joe Felan, interim chair of the Department of Management, worked with Dr. Kang on logistics and transportation research. Their manuscript, “An Ontological Approach to Enterprise Knowledge Modeling in a Shipping Company,” will be published in the International Journal of Knowledge Management in October.

Roger Dorsey’s manuscript “Mayo Foundation and the End of Tax Exceptionalism in Judicial Deference” has been accepted for publication in Practical Tax Strategies.

The College of Business sales program has been rated a Top University Sales Program for 2011 by the Sales Education Foundation.

Each year, the foundation reviews the existing university sales programs for consideration. Programs demonstrating a strong sales curriculum, university recognition and support — and the opportunity for experiential learning such as internships — are then selected for SEF’s publication, Sales Education Annual.

Dean Anthony Chelte credited Dr. Steve Edison, professor of marketing and advertising, “for his unswerving commitment to excellence in professional sales education.

“His commitment and the support of colleagues in the College of Business have resulted in this noteworthy achievement,” Chelte said.

UALR COB Professor Lars Powell will participate in a panel discussion, “Examining the Case for Federal Earthquake Insurance,” from 10 a.m to noon Thursday, July 14, at the Heritage Foundation’s House Annex in Washington, D.C.

The event is sponsored by the Heritage Foundation, a research and educational institution whose mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies, and the Heartland Institute, a research and education organization aimed at discovering, developing, and promoting free-market solutions to social and economic problems.

Other panelists include Eli Lehrer, vice president of the Heartland Institute; Ralph Rexach, former commissioner of insurance in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and Greg Heerde, managing director of Aon Benfield, considered an industry leader in treaty, facultative, and capital markets.

In the wake of the earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan earlier this spring, Sens. Barbara Boxer and Diane Feinstein, both D-Calif., introduced legislation aimed at substantially lowing the cost of earthquake insurance. The proposed Earthquake Insurance Affordability Act would allow state-sponsored earthquake insurance programs to access federal loan guarantees and better prepare financially for quakes. Currently, the only such program in the U.S. is the California Earthquake Authority.

Standard U.S. homeowners insurance policies do not cover earthquakes. Each year, about 5,000 earthquakes hit the United States, mainly in California and Alaska. The New Madrid fault runs through parts of eastern Arkansas. Earlier this spring, the state suspended operations at some natural gas drilling sites to determine if the activity caused a spate of earthquakes through the central part of the state.

UALR’s College of Business sales program has been rated a Top University Sales Program for 2011 by the Sales Education Foundation.

Each year, the foundation reviews the existing university sales programs for consideration. Programs demonstrating a strong sales curriculum, university recognition and support – and the opportunity for experiential learning such as internships – are then selected for SEF’s publication, Sales Education Annual.

College of Business Dean Anthony Chelte credited Dr. Steve Edison, professor of marketing and advertising who also directs the sales program, “for his unswerving commitment to excellence in professional sales education.

“His commitment and the support of colleagues in the College of Business have resulted in this noteworthy achievement,” Chelte said.