About the College
2016: A Banner Year for the USF Muma College of Business
John "Papa John" Schnatter, the successful pizza entrepreneur, and Scott O'Neil, the CEO of the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers and the NHL's New Jersey Devils, share insights from their lives and careers on the first day of the USF Sport & Entertainment Lecture Series. The series closes with former WNBA President Donna Orender speaking the next day. The lecture series is organized by the Muma College of Business Sport & Entertainment Management Program, which is in its fourth year and is gaining a reputation for bringing in high-profile, elusive executives and corporate decision makers to speak candidly about their lives and careers.
Jacqueline Reck, accounting professor and associate dean for the Muma College of Business, is named to serve on the Governmental Accounting Standards Board's Financial Reporting Model Task Force. Reck, who has served on the board's advisory council since 2012, is the only accounting professor appointed to the 24-person task force.
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The next generation of start-up leaders get a boost from Naples entrepreneurs Frank and Ellen Daveler who donate $2.9 million to USF's Muma College of Business to spearhead a state-wide effort to educate and support entrepreneurs. The transformational estate and cash gift will establish the Frank & Ellen Daveler Entrepreneurship Program and include an annual scholarship of $50,000 for business students who are the first in their families to attend college.
Two of professional car racing's stars – one on the racetrack, the other in the boardroom – visit USF on the eve of the Daytona 500 to chat with students about the business and engineering of the sport. Matt Kenseth, a two-time Daytona 500 Champion, and Joie Chitwood III, Daytona International Speedway president and a 1995 graduate of the USF MBA program, spend the afternoon on USF's campus talking to graduate business and engineering students.
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In a continuing effort to help give students a competitive edge in the workforce, the Muma College of Business partners with IBM Watson Analytics. Through this new relationship, each student will be entitled to a subscription of Watson Analytics Student Edition at no cost. The goal is to help prepare the next generation of "citizen" data scientists.
Jabil Circuit CEO Mark Mondello, who runs a company that is one of the world's largest contract manufacturers with more than 180,000 employees working at 102 locations in 28 countries is the first to sit down with Muma College of Business Dean Moez Limayem for the Conversation with a CEO series. Mondello stresses listening more than talking, seeing leadership as a servant role and being consistent in actions both work-related and personal. The event concludes with audience questions on every subject from his management style to how he stays sharp and relevant.
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University of South Florida accounting grad Bei Ye is among 75 certified public accountant candidates nationwide honored for their scores on the CPA exam. Ye, who graduated in 2014 from the USF Lynn Pippenger School of Accountancy, was one of the recipients of the 2015 Elijah Watt Sells award, which recognizes CPA candidates who pass all four sections of the CPA exam on the first try with an average score above 95.5 percent. A total of 93,742 individuals sat for the examination, with only 75 qualifying for the award.
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A frequent giver to USF, Mohamad Ali Hasbini's gift of $300,000 has resulted in the Muma College of Business naming the doctoral suite after him. Hasbini, who returned to the Muma College of Business to earn a third degree more than 35 years after completing his first one, will graduate with a Doctor of Business Administration degree in 2017. Hasbini explains that getting his doctorate was his ultimate goal. He and other doctoral students now study out of the Mohamad Ali Hasbini Doctor of Business Administration Suite. Over the years, Hasbini has donated nearly $1 million to USF.
USF grad Ashley Washington, 25, becomes the youngest alumna to fully fund a business scholarship on her own. What began as a $5,000 gift by Washington – the first in her family to attend college – has blossomed and her employer matched the donation, as did the state, through the First Generation Scholarship program, enhancing the scholarship's value to $20,000.
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Muma marketing professor Dipayan Biswas is one of the authors of a published paper that is picked up by local, national and international media. His theory: When people dine in dimly lit environments they are more likely to make unhealthy food choices than when they eat in a brighter venue. The paper was published in the Journal of Marketing Research. "We feel more alert in brighter rooms," Biswas says, "and therefore tend to make more healthful, forward-thinking decisions."
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Mike Mondello, a Muma College of Business professor with the Sport & Entertainment
Management Program, will take his research to the ballgame as he becomes the first
faculty member to participate in an externship program and spend a few months working
for the Tampa Bay Rays' senior management. He will use analytics to address long-term
issues critical to the success of the organization. The newly implemented externship
program gives faculty members a chance to connect with the business
community and bring back real business issues to offer in the classroom.
As part of a White House initiative to close a skills gap in the tech workforce, the Muma College of Business announces it will partner with CareerSource Tampa Bay on a $3.8 million Department of Labor grant to train young adults in Tampa Bay to fill technology roles. The TechHire Partnership Grant that Tampa Bay received is one of just 39 federal grants awarded nationwide to support community-based, public-private workforce partnerships.
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Responding to changing business and industry demands, USF enhances its Management Information Systems (MIS) major – keeping the important information systems content but including more coursework that focuses on analytics and business intelligence skills related to "big data." Bachelor of Science in MIS now is known as the Bachelor of Science in Business Analytics and Information Systems.
The 2016 Muma College of Business Scholarship Luncheon announces that more than $475,000 in scholarships will be awarded to about 200 students. Some scholarships are awarded on a need basis, some on a merit basis and others are awarded to students studying for a particular degree or based on student talent.
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The Muma College of Business' Marketing Department was named among the top 60 programs in the world in terms of research productivity. According to the University of Texas-Dallas Top 100 Business School Research Rankings, from 2014-2016, the Muma College of Business marketing program's ranking is based on academic publications in the top three premier marketing journals in the world. The survey moves the department well above its peers in prestigious universities such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of California-Berkeley, the University of Virginia and Dartmouth College.
Javier Marin, a business consultant and former assistant director for the Florida Small Business Development Center at USF, won the Florida Small Business Development Center's Network State Star Award during the opening day of the America's Small Business Development Center's National Conference in Orlando. Marin is honored for assisting small businesses throughout Tampa Bay's 10-county region.
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The popular and increasingly prominent lecture series put on by University of South Florida's Sport & Entertainment Management Program lands two heavy hitters: Tod Leiweke, the chief operating officer for the National Football League and Don Garber, commissioner of Major League Soccer. Hundreds of sports and entertainment fans, students, faculty and the public, attended, listening as the two guests shared their experiences in the business of sports and how both their products emerged from contests waged on fields in front of wooden bleachers to stadiums filled with tens of thousands of screaming fans. The Muma College of Business Sport and Entertainment Management graduate program announces that over the three years of its existence, it has placed 98 percent of its graduates in well-paying jobs.
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The Muma College of Business' Center for Entrepreneurship has the best graduate program in the Southeast and is ranked No. 10 in the nation by Entrepreneur magazine and The Princeton Review. The center is the only Florida entrepreneurship program on the list. The rankings have placed the center in the top 25 for the past 10 consecutive years and its success is attributed to its interdisciplinary approach and hands-on learning opportunities for graduate students.
Bob Dutkowsky, CEO of Tech Data in Clearwater, a company that pulls in more than $26 billion a year in net sales, speaks to more than 100 business leaders and USF faculty, alumni and students at the Muma College of Business's third Conversation with a CEO series.The series gives young alumni and friends of the college a chance to learn from someone whom they might not normally get to meet and to glean insight from seasoned professionals willing to share some life lessons.
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A pair of University of South Florida Muma College of Business professors win prestigious awards at the annual Workshop on Information Technology and Systems conference held in Dublin, Ireland. Kaushik Dutta and Balaji Padmanabhan, with the Information Systems Decision Sciences Department, returned to Tampa with top honors in two categories. Dutta co-authored the paper that won first place and Padmanabhan, a graduate student and two USF St. Petersburg professors, collaborated to win the best prototype award.
CBIZ MHM, a Top 10 accounting and professional business services provider, announces a gift that funds a five-year teaching fellowship in the Lynn Pippenger School of Accountancy. The announcement was made at a gathering of about 130 people at the firm's office in Tampa, where half of CBIZ MHM employees are USF graduates. The Lynn Pippenger School of Accountancy is ranked No. 20 on the College Choice listings of the best accounting programs in the nation.
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