Math and Munitions, the Business of the Military
How does a Keuka degree fit into daily military life?
Maddox '07, right, is sworn in as a USAF Captain.
Just ask U.S. Air Force Capt. Ryan Maddox ’07, who graduated with a B.A. in math and a B.S. in business management, and now serves as operations officer for the U.S. Air Force 52nd Equipment Maintenance Squadron, which includes four officers and 461 enlisted airmen at Spangdahlem Air Base in Germany. Maddox is second-in-command to the squadron commander.
“I handle operations and she handles the personnel—the pats on the back and the kicks in the butt, so to speak,” he said. “We provide munitions support and we do maintenance. Let’s say after flying, a part gets damaged and needs repair. We repair it through metal fabrication.”
In addition, the squadron handles what Maddox calls “deep tissue maintenance,” such that after every 400 flight hours logged by a particular plane, it will spend from 7-20 days in the base hangar getting stripped down for more intensive analysis or repairs.
Maddox supervises logistics, storage, supply chain management and more for Air Force munitions, like this bomb, at his base in Germany.
“As far as business is concerned, maintenance and munitions is pretty much like any other business. We have a product, a process, customers, logistics, and a supply chain. I market my product to my customers – other squadrons – so they get what they want and I’m able to supply it. It’s almost a direct correlation [to business].” (more…)
SIFE Out, Enactus In
SIFE, a familiar acronym on the Keuka College campus since the advent of the 21st century, no longer exists.
In a move designed to reaffirm its “long-standing commitment to using entrepreneurial action as a catalyst for progress,” the international organization Students in Free Enterprise has changed its name to Enactus.
“We needed a name that captured the entrepreneurial spirit that fuels everything we do,” said Alvin Rohrs, CEO. “We were also eager to create a name that reflected how global this organization has become.”
Some 57,000 students are members of Enactus clubs in 1,600 colleges and universities in 39 countries.
“Entrepreneurial action is not something that is relevant to a single culture or nationality,” said Rohrs. “What we do is just as powerful in Shanghai as it is in Sao Paulo, just as transformative whether we are in San Francisco or Sydney.”
Or in Keuka Park, N.Y., where the Keuka College SIFE team has enhanced the quality of life in the region while qualifying for nine SIFE national competitions in the past 11 years. (more…)
Meet New Faculty: Robert Dischner
Editor’s Note: This is the eighth in a series of profiles of new, full-time faculty members who have joined the Keuka community.
Robert Dischner loves being in the classroom and said it’s always been his dream to be a college professor.
The former director of learning and development for utility companies such as Niagara Mohawk and National Grid, joined the full-time Accelerated Studies for Adults Program (ASAP) faculty this year and sees many similarities between the corporate night classes he once led for utility company staffers and the ones he now teaches for Keuka management students in cohorts in Corning and Elmira.
Business experience was woven through his professional career, which includes nearly 30 years of human resources and professional development work. Dischner even had a brief stint as a stockbroker, before he landed his first teaching job: instructing company employees of Niagara-Mohawk in finance and accounting.
In addition to developing employees in technical disciplines, his department set up a corporate university that sought to expand the role of a traditional training department.
“We wanted to educate our employees, not train them, and doing that at night was the way the industry was headed. I didn’t realize at the time, but I was practicing, in a classic way, the model that Keuka has,” Dischner said of ASAP’s once-weekly evening classes, small-group cohorts, and modular format. “It’s a great way to do research and learn at the same time.
“I started off working in the field, then in the training department teaching and getting involved with major change initiatives,” added Dischner, who ultimately found himself in charge of technical training in gas and electric utilities, with approximately 80-90 people reporting to him. But the classroom called to him still.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in political science, a master’s in education, and a Ph.D. in education, all from the State University of New York at Buffalo (UB). While his dissertation was in education, it included a focus on business development and reinforced a passion for the difference between training and teaching, he said. (more…)
Meet New Faculty: Samuel Bateman
Editor’s Note: This is the seventh in a series of profiles of new, full-time faculty who have recently joined the Keuka community.
New to the Keuka faculty this fall in the Accelerated Studies for Adults Program (ASAP) is Samuel Bateman, who is teaching classes in managerial accounting, managerial finances and decision-making to students in both the bachelor’s and master’s degree management programs.
The Colorado transplant is completing a transition to full-time academia after spending nearly 30 years in software sales, business development and international sales and marketing. Starting in 2005, Bateman began teaching part-time at North Carolina Wesleyan College and Wake-Forest University. He next taught online and international business courses for Lock Haven University in Pennsylvania, as well as some international business classes for the undergraduate program at Walden University, which operates online programs from headquarters in Minnesota.
Bateman, now a Rochester resident, holds two master’s degrees – one in public and international affairs from the University of Pittsburgh, and an MBA from North Carolina State University.
“I’ll be able to relate to the ASAP students because I obtained both of my master’s degrees while working full-time,” Bateman said. (more…)
Meet New Faculty: Yang Zhao
Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series of profiles of new, full-time faculty who have joined the Keuka community.
Back in the fall of 2006, Dr. Yang Zhao served as an academic adviser to four international students attending classes on the home campus in Keuka Park. Today, some 79 international students from 12 countries attend classes here, learning how to compare and contrast America with its global neighbors in background, economy, and leadership development.
This fall, after earning her doctorate and serving several years as an adjunct professor for Keuka, Zhao became part of the full-time faculty, teaching courses in economics and leadership to graduate students in Keuka’s Master of Science in management with a concentration in international business (MSMIB) program.
Her studies in China focused on economics, and she holds a B.S. in economics from Shangdong University of Finance and an M.A. in economics from Dongbei University of Finance and Economics. While teaching in China’s Qiqihar University, Zhao published seven research articles relative to strategic planning, management, marketing, economics and business to help entrepreneurs and companies to better serve their community. In 2003, she won the Outstanding Young Professor award, for the Hei Long Jiang province of China. During that time, she also served as an academic coordinator for the Keuka China Program (KCP) and assistant professor at Qiqihar University.
Here in the U.S., she has added an M.S. in management from Keuka, and just this summer, completed an education doctorate in executive leadership from St. John Fisher College. In addition to her many years of experience in international education, as a full-time and adjunct professor, Zhao has also spent seven years as a local business owner and entrepreneur working in property management. Her connection to the local business and community network, as well as related marketing and financial management skills, help provide what international learners and domestic students are looking for when they study at Keuka, she said.
“As a business leader, you have to understand the entrepreneur’s point of view, to understand how to help students start thinking as a future leader, not just a manager. That will help students to be successful in their career development,” Zhao said.
(more…)
Meet New Faculty: Sam Ferrara
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of profiles of new full-time faculty who have joined the Keuka community.
Nearly 35 years ago, Sam Ferrara left Clyde, a small town in Central New York, to head out to college for a degree and a career in big business. During his 20 years in sales and consulting, he worked in Albany; Charlotte, N.C; San Antonio, Texas; Cleveland, Ohio; and Melbourne, Australia. He then made a switch to education and now has another seven years in academia. Before coming to Keuka, Ferrara was an adjunct professor at Skidmore College.
Now making a daily trek from Clyde to Keuka Park, Ferrara instructs undergraduates as an assistant professor of management in the Division of Business and Management. This semester finds him teaching courses in advertising, training and development, and operations and production management. Part of the allure of this job was the opportunity to return to his roots.
“I enjoy working with students from small towns in this area and I’d like to make a contribution back to an area that’s pretty economically depressed right now: upstate New York in general and my hometown specifically,” he said.
Ferrara holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from SUNY Brockport, an MBA from Baldwin-Wallace College, and is completing his doctorate in organizational studies at University at Albany. His dissertation involves interdisciplinary study of organizations and Ferrara is honing in on the impact of CEO duality on firm performance in a post-financial crisis world.
Duality is the term given when the top executive is both CEO and chairman of the board, and while having one person in a dual role may make it easier to get projects done, questions arise whether that one person has too much power.
“I’m very interested in corporate governance, and who watches out for the shareholders,” Ferrara said, citing the high-risk decisions and outright malfeasance of some in the realms of high finance. “It doesn’t matter what level you’re at — it’s interesting how people with power will use the power in self-interest. Does power do that to a person, or does the person have that power?
My hypothesis is that it’s not the whole, it’s the few.”
Ferrara said his goal as a professor is to engage students in both utilitarian (practical) and intrinsic knowledge, and he hopes to be effective in helping students grow as individuals and professionals.
“I want to prepare them to work in an ethical way and keep community awareness in mind,” he said.
Snapshot of a Graduate: Nick Simpson
Where can a Keuka degree take you? This is the sixth in a series of snapshot profiles on members of Keuka’s Class of 2012.
Nick Simpson ’12 graduated Keuka with a degree in management and has been employed since May with Places.Mobile, a company that provides mobile marketing for businesses, and was certified by Google on May 1 as the upstate New York contractor for Google Business Photos. Thanks to the new Google program, a company such as an auto dealer, coffee shop, restaurant or other retailer, can give prospective customers a 360-degree interactive virtual tour of the inside of their establishment. The virtual tour is directly attached to Google search results, maps or ads and can be embedded into a businesses’ website or Facebook page.
Penn Yan resident Nick Simpson
Simpson is one of three Keuka students working as independent sub-contractors with Jim Hilker, Keuka’s director of educational technology, and owner of Places. Mobile. Simpson, who served as president of the Keuka Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team, connected with Hilker during the spring semester for a training session on how to market enhancements to a business’s Google Places listing so merchants could capitalize on mobile marketing to smartphone users. Now, he is handling panoramic photography, while the two other Keuka students are focused on sales and marketing.
Even before this door opened, Simpson said, “I wanted to get involved with all this stuff because Jim kind of led me into the whole Google universe and the opportunity that existed there. He’s grown with that to find new and better opportunities within that Google sphere.”
According to Hilker, the efforts of the three Keuka students gave Places.Mobile a top three standing for Google in its first month, and for June, was Google’s No. 1 certified independent photo contractor nationwide, based on its number of photo shoots.
“I think it has the potential to turn into a true full-time position,” said Simpson, who has traveled to Rochester, Syracuse and other locales to shoot the panoramic images.
While Simpson said he could not yet make direct correlations between his classes and the responsibilities of this job, he felt what he learned from Keuka goes beyond textbooks.
“The lesson may be getting up in the morning and doing a full day’s work, or advice from professors that you have to be flexible and not limit yourself. You might say, ‘I want to be an advertising consultant in Rochester, N Y,’ but it may not be what you thought it was going to be. You need to run with the opportunities presented to you and make the most of them.”
To explore what might be in your future with a Keuka degree, request more information.
What’s New: Keuka Vietnam
Editor’s Note: In terms of “What’s new at Keuka College,” the newest are 174 Vietnamese students who began pursuit of management science degrees Oct. 3 at the University of Science, Vietnam National University—Ho Chi Minh City (HCMUS), ITEC (International Training and Education Center). Assistant Editor Rachel E. Dewey conducted an interview with six of them via Skype and email.
Twenty-one year-old Tran Thi Phuong Khanh (“Khanh”) found much to love in the first week of classes at HCMUS.
Left to right: Lee, Rosaline, Khanh, Kannie, Katherine, and Jin
“The professors are so friendly, and that makes me feel comfortable,” she said. Tran chose Keuka in order to study in an international environment that would make her confident, and provide realistic experiences, not just pages in a book.
“Yesterday, I learned about international experiential education,” she said, referring to Keuka’s reputation as the national leader in experiential, hands-on learning.
Like a handful of other new HCMUS students, Tran would like to finish her Keuka degree at the Keuka Park campus. After graduation, she hopes to become a public relations manager, in addition to organizing and promoting events.
(more…)
Meet New Faculty: Dawn Grosso, Esq.
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of profiles on new, full-time faculty members.
Photo by Case Hamilton '12
As a lawyer for 17 years, Dawn Grosso of Victor often presents case studies to the adult students in her business law classes.
The one that generally raises the most eyebrows, she said, is that the law of contracts in many states includes a principle known as “unjust enrichment” that would allow, for example, a painter who accidentally painted the wrong building to be paid for the wholesale value of his services by the property owner receiving the fresh coat of “surprise” paint.
“The law … [states] … the homeowner received the benefit of a paint job even if he didn’t ask for it,” explained Grosso, assistant professor of business and management. “Most students generally find that outrageous, but the cases are often upheld.”
According to Grosso, a prospective business manager taking classes in Keuka’s Accelerated Studies for Adults Program (ASAP), should know some basic laws for risk management purposes. He or she may also need to work with a lawyer on business matters, said Grosso, who returned this fall to teach ASAP evening classes full-time to students working toward bachelor or master’s degrees in management across Western New York.
Grosso first taught ASAP classes for Keuka part-time starting in 2004, then spent four years teaching accounting and law at her alma mater, Alfred University, where she had earned bachelor’s degrees in accounting and management more than 20 years earlier.
“I’m thrilled to be back working with all the wonderful people I was working with before, as well as meeting all the new students and staff,” she said, adding how significantly Keuka’s non-traditional degree programs have grown. “I’m very excited to be a part of that growth, creating new programs and new opportunities for so many students all over the world.”
According to Grosso, students need some basic knowledge of legal issues related to human resources, breach of contract, or international law disputes in order to be good managers.
“I like to bring everyday experiences from my law practice to the classroom,” said Grosso, who manages her own law practice in Fairport, and is an arbitrator for the 7th Judicial District of New York. Her experience has included setting up small corporations, handling bankruptcy matters for both creditors or debtors, and litigation of civil matters often involving contract disputes between businesses.
“This really prepares students for the real word, debates or disagreements with others, and maintaining professionalism while trying to convince someone to see it their way.
“I’m also adding the global component and international component due to our global economy and the fact that these management students will be using international laws to facilitate everyday contracts,” she said.
Grosso obtained her Juris Doctor from Pace Law School in White Plains where she won the New York Jurisprudence Award for Appellate Advocacy in 1991. For more than seven years, she served as a confidential counsel and legal adviser for two New York State Supreme Court Justices in the Seventh Judicial District. In addition to Keuka and Alfred, she has taught classes at Medaille College and Rochester Business Institute.
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