Economics, Finance and Management Department
The Economics, Finance and
Management Department of
Manhattanville College is pleased to
present the ninth edition of the
departmental newsletter. The purpose
of publishing this newsletter is to keep
students and alumni informed about
what is happening in the department.
To that end, we invite all of you to give
us your comments and feedback. Let us
Volume 9, Issue 1
WE L C O ME TO TH E EFM NEW S LE TT ER
July , 2015
FACULTY Nimish Adhia—International economics, economic development
Tina Bardsley—Cross media marketing, consumer-brand relationship, interactive
and digital marketing, consumer attitude
formation and change.
Efraim Berkovich— Microeconomics, finance, monetary economics, payment
systems.
David Borker — International Accounting, International Management, International
Marketing, Business and Accounting
Higher Education.
James Bryan — Microeconomic analysis of
public policy, public finance; economic education.
Robert Derrell — Financial markets, economic theory, econometrics.
Kyoko Mona — Macroeconomics theory, public finance, defense and peace
economics.
William C. Perkins — Economic theory,
government and industry, statistics, money and banking.
Heather Perretta—Organizational theory, institutional change, higher education
organizations, changing employment
relationships.
FACULTY EMERITAE
Anna Sachko Gandolfi — Finance,
mathematical economics, labor
economics, forecasting, money and banking.
Cecilia Ann Winters — International economics, heterodox economics,
economic development.
ADJUNCT FACULTY
Alan Anderson
Edwin Bowman
Robert Candee
Michael Coelho
Alex Gialanella
Paul Jakubek
Rosalie Liebowitz
Danielle Martin
Ken Mias
Sultan Niazi
Erik Paulson
Michael Scimeca
John Wenninger
Rindlaub Scholarship
Rindlaub Scholarship Continued News about our seniors
Graduating Students and their
Future Careers
Guest Speakers Capstone Class Students
Alumni Raise Money for Pediatric
Cancer
News on the full-time faculty Young Global Leader
Valiant Fund
Economic Freedom Institute
Eastern Economic Association Department Social
New Adjuncts
Letter to our Alumni
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Pg. 10 Pg. 11
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It is my pleasure to announce that Professor David Borker,
Professor Kyoko Mona and Professor Heather Perretta were
awarded tenure by the College this year. Manhattanville
recognized Professor Jim Bryan for thirty years of service and
recognized Professor Efraim Berkovich, David Borker, Kyoko
Mona and Heather Perretta for five years of service.
Congratulations to all!
Dr. Glenn Hubbard, Professor of Economics and Dean of the Graduate Business
School at Columbia University gave a lecture in the spring 2015 semester based on
his recently published book entitled Balance. More information on Dr. Hubbard’s
talk is provided on page 9 in this newsletter.
This year a total of twenty eight seniors earned department honors. This total
includes six in economics, fourteen in finance, seven in business management and
one in marketing. Eight prizes were also awarded to seniors for excellent work in
economics, finance, business management and marketing. Six juniors shared the
Rindlaub Award. Details are presented in the newsletter.
We are also very proud of our two alumni, Linda Kirkpatrick ‘99 and Victor
Scipioni ‘92, who were recently appointed to the Manhattanville Board of
Trustees. Linda is Group Head/Senior Vice President, US Market Development at
MasterCard and Victor is Vice President of Trading at Neuberger Berman.
The Department of Economics, Finance and Management redesigned the finance
curriculum and it was approved by the New York State Education Department
this spring. The new finance curriculum goes into effect this fall 2015 semester.
The redesigned finance major includes a new required course called Principles of
Finance, created by Professor Robert Derrell. It was offered for the first time in
the spring of 2015. The new curriculum will strengthen the finance major.
Three new adjunct professors will be joining us in the Fall. Please welcome
Laura Bigaouette, John Dolan and Matthew Taylor.
William Perkins, Chair
About the Department
know what’s going on in your lives,
where you’re working, where you’re
living, and any other information you
care to share with us. Also tell us
what you’d like to see in this
newsletter. We hope that this will
help our alumni to stay in touch with
us. Hope you enjoy this ninth edition
of the EFM Newsletter.
Inside This Issue:
EFM Newsletter
Page 2
(Continued on the next page)
Every year, the Andrew Rindlaub Scholarship is awarded to a junior who excels academically. We
are proud to present Reem Ahmed, Briana Chambliss, Nataly Cifuentes Beteta, Mari Morimoto,
Paulaniokealohapau’ole Obrero and William Silber with this award and congratulate them for their
great achievement.
All of the Rindlaub Scholarship recipients are in the picture above with Professor Perkins at the Un-
dergraduate Academic Award Ceremony.
Reem Ahmed is an international student from Bahrain. She is a Business Management major with
minors in Accounting and Spanish. She also does a lot on campus such as work for the Undergradu-
ate Admissions office as an office assistant, first year mentor (The Mentor Program), a peer tutor
for Accounting (Academic Resource Center). She is a Castle Scholar (Castle Scholars Honors Pro-
gram), and also a Duchesne Scholar (Community Service). She is the President of the Muslim Stu-
dent Association on campus, and the Vice President of the Manhattanville Art Club.
Briana Chambliss is a junior majoring in finance with a minor in political science and is expected to
graduate spring 2016. She found her passion for finance after taking an introductory economics
course here at Manhattanville during her sophomore year. Throughout her years at Manhattanville,
Briana, has taken on a number of leadership roles and has acquired professional experiences
through various internships and jobs. Briana is currently apart of the Manhattanville Mentor Pro-
gram, and is a tutor both on and off campus. She has interned at New York Life, and Siller and Co-
hen Family Wealth Advisors. This summer she plans to intern at Bank of America for the Global
Middle Office. Briana is also a member of the Connie Hogarth Center for Social Action, where she
participates in social justice activism. So far, she has had great experiences at Manhattanville, and
looks forward to becoming a senior. Briana is honored to have received the Rindlaub Award, and
said it wouldn’t have been possible without the amazing professors in the department.
Rindlaub Scholarship
EFM Newsletter
Page 3
Nataly Cifuentes Beteta is an international student from Managua, Nicaragua. She is majoring in both
Communications and Business Management with a concentration in Marketing. Due to her love of lan-
guages and passion for foreign cultures, she is also minoring in German Studies. As an avid writer, she
develops content for online journals through the Office of Institutional Advancement. Nataly also acts
as a tutor through the Academic Resource Center, assisting her peers in their studies. In her free time,
Nataly partakes in philanthropic activities by serving as coordinator of CETA, Creative Expression
Through Art, where she aids children in art enrichment. She also works to strengthen the relationship
between alumni and their alma mater through the Student Ambassador Association.
Mari Morimoto came to the USA from her home country of Japan in 2013 and transferred to Manhat-
tanville College in 2014. She is currently a junior and majoring in Business Management (concentration
in Marketing ). She learned about Manhattanville from her aunt who is an alum. Mari says her life at
Mville so far is going better than she expected, and also said this highly diverse community allows her to
have many opportunities and help her grow as a person and a student. She would like to thank all of
her professors and friends for their great support and couldn’t receive this wonderful award without
their help.
Pualaniokealohapau‘ole Obrero, or Pua as most people know her, is currently a junior at Manhattan-
ville College majoring in Finance and Computer Science. She has been a Castle Scholar since her fresh-
man year. Outside of the classroom, she is a Supplemental Instructor and Peer Tutor in Mville’s Aca-
demic Resource Center and will be a Mentor for the 2015-2016 academic year, assisting incoming fresh-
man with their transition into the Mville community. Growing up in a single-parent home in Hawaii,
she had a very limited relationship with finances, but she knew how to balance a checkbook. At Mville,
she decided to find out what all the fuss was about, and learned how to calculate the time value of mon-
ey.
William Silber is currently a junior at Manhattanville College, majoring in Finance and Political Sci-
ence as well as minoring in Legal Studies. Hi is the youngest of a family of six, with two older sisters
and an older twin brother who also attends Manhattanville. Aside from his passion in the classroom,
he is also a member of, and proudly represent, the men's soccer team. He chose to major in Finance
solely because his father has always held employment in the realm of finance, and with immense admi-
ration for his father, he wanted to follow in his footsteps. His future plans include graduating from
Manhattanville in about a year and pursuing higher education in either Law School or Graduate Busi-
ness School.
Rindlaub Scholarship Continued
Many of our graduating seniors received departmental honors. The department is very
proud of them and of all our 2015 graduates and wishes them well as they embark on
their future paths. Below are some pictures that were taken of the honor students along with Professors Perkins, Bry-
an, Borker and Perretta at the reception following the Baccalaureate on May 15th.
EFM Newsletter Page 4
Honors in Economics:
Krishnadev Addanki, Shah-
razan Isa, Santiago Man-
cheno-Gutierrez, Alexis
Lanzillotti, Lashey Shelly
and Paul Sirignano received
honors. Alexis Lanzillotti
received the economics prize
for top graduating senior in
the major.
Honors in Finance:
Gabriel Berlingeri-Dutriz,
Kevin Brady, Oscar Brugal
Davila, Luke Challier, Shan
Du, Anh La, Christina
Laincy, Eric McClure, Juan
Carlos Mejia Baez, Jack
Polak, Carl Anton Racklin,
Kevin Struempfler, Nha
Truong and Roberto Velas-
tegui Nunez received hon-
ors. Juan Carlos Mejia
Beaz, Carl Anton Racklin,
Kevin Struempfler and Nha
Truong received the fi-
nance prize for top graduat-
ing senior in the major.
Honors in Business Man-
agement:
Nathalie Aguiriano, Christi-
na Forlenza, Amanda Ma-
terasso, Jose Haro Rosero,
Suyapa Hasbun Velasco,
Michelle Modica and Maria
Robbins received honors.
Michelle Modica and Maria
Robbins received the busi-
ness management prize for
top graduating senior in the
major.
Honors in Marketing:
Maria Pava Cabal received
honors as well as the mar-
keting prize for top gradu-
ating senior in the major.
News About Our Seniors
Graduating Seniors and their Future Careers
Lashey Shelly will be working at Furman Kornfeld & Brennan, LLP as a legal assistant and will be attending
law school in the future. Brandon Alicea will be working at Lincoln Financial & Sagemark Consulting. Kev-
in Struempfler will be working at FirstKey Mortgage in Rye Brook. Priscilla Gonzalez will be working at
Health Care Navigator, LLC, as a Human Resources Assistant and will be attending graduate school in the
fall. Paul Sirignano will be working at FundAdministration as a Financial Services Operator and Stephen
Santon will be working at Northwestern Mutual as a Financial Advisor.
We wish all of our graduates good luck and much success in whatever path they have chosen!
EFM Newsletter Page 5
The Manhattanville Management Capstone Seniors Find Success in an Online Business Strategy Game once again!
Guest Speakers
In the fall, Professor Efraim Berkovich invited Mr. John Dolan, a Wall Street vet-
eran of 30+ years, to speak during his Money & Banking class. Mr. Dolan shared
his perspectives on how to think about Bitcoin/bitcoin, the uses of Bitcoin, and
how forces may impact the future viability of Bitcoin.
The word Bitcoin can be used to describe both a digital currency, as well as proto-
col for securely sharing information (bitcoin). In Mr. Dolan’s presentation, he
discussed his experience as ex-chair of digital currency based on solar energy, an
expert witness in cases related to the Financial Crises, and market maker for an
electronic trading platform on home prices. Mr. Dolan’s Wall Street experience includes serving as partner and
CIO at Hyperion Capital Management, CIO at Crystal River REIT, managing director at Banker’s Trust,
managing director at Salomon Brothers, and vice-president at Citibank. Mr. Dolan is in the picture above with
Wei Chen ‘16.
In the spring, Melinda Rolfs, Business Leader at MasterCard Advisors, spoke to Professor Berkovich’s Corpo-
ration Finance class about equity valuation analysis. Ms. Rolfs spoke about methods of valuing public compa-
nies.
In the fall, Professor Robert Derrell invited Manhattanville graduate Ted Rydesky, who now works in institu-
tional equity sales at Citigroup, to talk to students about what it takes to work on Wall Street, the stock market
and careers in the financial services industry. He also invited Manhattanville graduate Quirico Perez, who now
works as an Investment Banker at Merrill Lynch, to come to the campus to speak to students about investment
banking and his experiences in making the transition from Manhattanville to Wall Street.
In the Fall 2014 semester, we had a team who made the Global Top 100 Performers - for every single week of
the simulation (all 10 weeks). They ended the game in a tie for 47th place out of a total of 4626 teams at 282
colleges/universities. The team members were Alex Avila, Matthew Caldarola, Matthew Kambeitz and Mi-
chael Lovitch.
Manhattanville Alumni, Paul Sirignano, JP Witkop and Joel Rosenberg participated in the Wall Street Decath-
lon. As a team they raised $11,000 for Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital with all proceeds going towards pe-
diatric cancer. This year the event hit $5,823,860 since it started seven years ago. Their team finished 8th place
out of 55 teams at the Decathlon. Paul said it was an amazing experience for them as a team and they could not
have been more proud of each other!
We are very proud of you all! Keep up the good work!
Manhattanville College Alumni Raise Money for Pediatric Cancer
EFM Newsletter Page 6
department
Professor Efraim Berkovich was recognized for his 5 years of service to Manhattanville. Unfortunately, it was
his last semester teaching at Manhattanville and we wish him well in his new endeavor.
Professor David Borker was awarded tenure by the college this year as well as promoted to Associate Professor
as well as recognized for his 5 years of service to Manhattanville. He has published and presented the following
papers: “IFRS Socio-cultural Orientation: SCO Observers & Dialogue Partners”. The Journal of the Ameri-
can Academy of Business, Cambridge, 20 (1), 229-237. “The IFRS Orientation Index: Quantification and Ex-
pansion of the IFRS Favorable Profile”. Global Review of Business and Economic Research (10) 1, 43-57.
“IFRS and Socio-cultural Orientation in Egypt, Iran and Iraq”. Journal of Accounting and Finance vol. 14(5),
175-185. “Sociocultural IFRS Value Analysis in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania”, The Business & Management
Review, (6), 2, 281-289 and presented at The International Conference on Business and Economic Development
(ICBED), which was held in NYC on March 30-31 where he also chaired the track on Finance and Accounting.
“Sociocultural IFRS Value Analysis in Five Balkan Countries” has been accepted for publication by the Jour-
nal of Accounting and Finance and was presented at the 2014 Annual Conference of the Academy of Interna-
tional Business-US Northeast Chapter (AIBNE) November 14-15, 2014. “Sociocultural IFRS Value Analysis:
The Baltic Countries” at the Academy of Business Research Conference in Atlantic City, NJ on September
26th.
Professor Jim Bryan made a presentation at the Eastern Economic Association/NABIG meetings in February
titled Making Opportunities More Equal: The Role of Basic Income. He also gave a lecture during Money
Smart Week in the Library and his lecture was about “How to Get Rich…(Not So) Quick: The Path to Finan-
cial Independence. In addition, he again was chosen as Faculty Member of the year by the Student Govern-
ment Association and was recognized for his 30 years of service to Manhattanville.
Professor Emerita Anna Sachko Gandolfi, Director of the Economic Freedom Institute, planned the conference
in the fall (Oct. 10-11), commemorating the 70th anniversary of the publication of Hayek's The Road to Serf-
dom. She also planned the spring lecture with Dr. R. Glenn Hubbard, Dean and Russell L. Carson Professor of
Finance and Economics at Columbia Business School. For more information about the Economic Freedom
Institute and the lecture and conference, please see page 9 of this newsletter.
Professor Kyoko Mona was awarded tenure by the college this year as well as promoted to Associate Professor.
She was also recognized for her 5 years of service to Manhattanville. Professor Mona attended the Eastern
Economic Association conference and her presentation was: “Agency Theory, UN Millennium Development
Goals and Participating Countries Performance” as well as “On the Economic Consequences of Independence
War: Evidence from Bangladesh”. She also had her paper: "Business and Real estate Price Cycles Across the
U.S.: Evidence from a Vector Markov-Switching Regression Exercise" (with Aram Balagyozan and Christos
Giannikos) accepted in the Journal of Housing Research in February. This past June, she participated in the
Robert Lipsey Memorial Panel in 90th Annual Western Economic Association International Conference in Ha-
waii and presented two papers: “Impact of Foreign Direct Investment, Openness and Institutions on Financial
development in emerging Market Economics” (with Aram Balagyozyan and Esin Cakan) and “The U.N. Mil-
lennium Development Goals: A Global Partnership for Development”. Professor Mona received a Manhattan-
ville summer research stipend to understand a post-war microeconomic adjustment process in Bangladesh.
Professor William Perkins was recognized by Manhattanville for his 25 years of service this past year. He re-
ceived a Manhattanville College rocking chair as a gift.
Professor Heather Perretta was awarded tenure by the college this year as well as recognized for her 5 years of
service to Manhattanville. During this summer she is revising a paper that looks at the organizing tactics of
early women’s organizations and the influence of these tactics on women’s admittance to the profession of law.
Also, she will be presenting a paper at the Academy of Management that looks at contract manufacturers that
attempt to build their own brands.
News on some of the Full-Time Faculty
“YOUNG GLOBAL LEADER” Manhattanville College Alumna Linda Kirkpatrick ‘99
Please see the information below regarding a Manhattanville College alumna, Linda
Kirkpatrick (nee Pistecchia), Group Head/Senior Vice President, US Market Develop-
ment, MasterCard who was recently selected as a “Young Global Leader”. The picture
above was taken at the NYSE on March 27th and her first order of business was ringing
the opening bell. We are very proud of her!
It’s one thing to receive recognition for leadership within one’s own company, but anoth-
er to be selected as the next generation of global leadership. Linda Kirkpatrick was re-
cently selected by the World Economic Forum (WEF) to serve as a member of the 2015
class of Young Global Leaders. Each year, WEF combs through thousands of nomina-
tions to hand pick a select group of young leaders who are making significant positive
contributions to their industries, communities and society at large. The 187 Young Global
Leaders come from 66 countries with equal representation from the public and private
sector. As Head of U.S. Core Merchant Verticals, Linda is driving merchant relation-
ships and business development efforts on behalf of MasterCard. This latest role comes
on top of her eighteen-year tenure at MasterCard where she has played a lead role engag-
ing with a broad cross-section of our global stakeholders including financial institutions,
merchants, investors and governments. Linda has also demonstrated a personal commit-
ment to volunteerism and mentorship. Her work with Junior Achievement, Habitat for
Humanity, Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation
are further evidence of her passion for youth and mentoring. Internally at MasterCard,
Linda helped to establish YoPros, a business resource group targeted to Young Profes-
sionals with over 500 members and chapters across three continents.
EFM Newsletter Page 7
EFM Newsletter Page 8
The “Valiant Fund” is a student-run investment fund overseen by the EFM depart-
ment and directed by Professor Efraim Berkovich. The fund offers students the op-
portunity to engage and learn about financial markets in a real-world setting.
Valiant Fund performance from 9/2014 to 6/2015
The Valiant Fund performed well over the last 10 months. Starting with a simulated $1m cash portfo-
lio, the Fund ended the school year with over $1.28m.
The main performance driver was a well-timed short position in crude oil futures. The fund estab-
lished short positions during the fall with oil prices in the $80s. The Fund began reducing the position
when crude oil prices dropped into the $50s in the spring. Reversing for a smaller size long position
gave the Fund a few more percentage points of return as oil prices bounced back to around $60.
While the Fund took various positions in equities, most trades did not significantly affect return. The
best equity position performer was a short position in Chipotle (CMG) with a gain of over $12k on
200 shares. The next best performer was a long position in the State Street S&P 500 ETF (SPY) with
a gain of about $3500. The worst performer was Tesla (TSLA) with a loss of over $3500. The Fund
dabbled in buying put options with both trades in CMG and in AGN losers for a loss of about $8200.
The Fund is grateful to Interactive Brokers, LLC for providing the professional trading platform
used by the Fund.
Valiant Fund
EFM Newsletter Page 9
LECTURE
On March 24, 2015, The Economic Freedom Institute (EFI) presented its
annual spring lecture. This year the speaker was Dr. R. Glenn Hubbard,
Dean and Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics at Colum-
bia Business School. Dr. Hubbard gave an extremely interesting talk about
the factors involved in the decline of great nations and discussed his book,
Balance, which was published in 2013 and which contains many more exam-
ples of things that went wrong, causing empires to decline, if not tumble.
The lecture was very well attended, with over 150 people in the audience.
Many students asked pertinent and probing questions, showing that Dr.
Hubbard was able to connect with them in a special way.
CONFERENCE
The Economic Freedom Institute had its first annual conference on October 10
-11, 2014. The focus of the conference was the 70th anniversary of the publica-
tion of Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom, the relationship between economic and
political freedom. In particular, does Hayek’s critique of political freedom in a
planned economy also apply to the modern regulatory, welfare and surveil-
lance state? Dr. Jerry Jordan, former President of the Federal Reserve Bank
of Cleveland was the keynote speaker who’s lecture was “Celebrating Hayek’s
Life” and Dr. William Poole, former President of the Federal Reserve Bank of
St. Louis was the luncheon speaker whose lecture was about “Hayek on The
Road to Serfdom”. Other prominent scholars also attended and presented pa-
pers and participated in discussions.
The Economic Freedom Institute is an enterprise which catalyzes both the popular and scholarly discussion of
issues related to economic freedom. The tools of applied economics are well developed and well integrated into
college and professional school curricula. However, the efficacy and value of public policies which promote or
impinge upon economic freedom are less discussed and less well understood.
Edward W. Ryan, Professor Emeritus of Economics at Manhattanville College, founded the EFI and was its
first Director. Dr. Anna Sachko Gandolfi, Ryan/Bacardi Professor of Economics Emerita is the current Direc-
tor of the Institute. She has published several articles in Economics and Finance journals and is the co-author
of Economics As An Evolutionary Science published by Transactions Publishers.
The Economic Freedom Institute
Glenn Hubbard and Anna Gandolfi,
Director of the EFI, after the lecture.
Jerry Jordan, Hannes Gissurarson,
and William Poole at the conference.
EFM Newsletter Page 10
Manhattanville Students Krishna Addanki, Shan Du, Shahrazan Isa and Santiago Mancheno presented their
Thesis Papers at the Eastern Economics Association Conference in NYC. Professors Bryan, Derrell, Mona and
Berkovich also attended the conference. Below are abstracts of their papers that they presented:
Krishna Addanki—The Future of Coal Under the Clean Power Plan: A Tale of Three
Regions In June of this year, the Obama administration and the EPA outlined a plan to significantly
reduce carbon emissions from outdated power plants. The new regulations will force aging
power plants to be either updated to the newer, more eco-friendly standard, or be decommis-
sioned. The U.S generates the majority of its electricity from coal, and as coal is considered
the “dirtiest” fossil fuel, it seems obvious that this tightening of regulation will have significant
effects on the usage of coal, as well as the types of coal burned. The paper analyzes prospects
for different coal burning utility companies based on their ability to comply with the new standard as well as a more in gen-
eral analysis of the market for the resource. The paper includes empirical work with a forecasting element, in hopes of us-
ing similar scenarios in the past to predict statistically the impact this change will have.
Shan Du—Does Split Arbitrage Exist in Stock Splits? Stock split only changes the number of shares outstanding and do not change the total dollar
value of shares, ownerships or cash flow. However, according to Grinblatt et al research,
when there is mere announcement of stock split, which is not mixed with other announce-
ments, splits generate an average positive return of 3% (461). Hwang et al also indicated in his
paper that reverse stock splits bring negative abnormal return to firms on stock market.
These market responses are similar to the reaction of merger arbitrage: when there are mer-
ger and acquisition, stock price of a target company will rise while the stock price of a com-
bined company will decrease so a merger arbitrageur is able to make profits from this uncer-
tainty. This paper argues that similar to merger arbitrage, there is “split arbitrage” when firms are experiencing either
stock forward splits or reverse splits. Although people believe that increase of price of company before an announcement of
stock split is temporary because investors psychologically think that they can use the same amount of money to buy more
shares of the company, there is arbitrage before forward stock split which demonstrates that when companies announce
stock split, the price of the companies will increase while the price of company who does reverse split will decrease. In addi-
tion, the split arbitrage affects companies' stock price positively in the long term.
Shahrazan Isa—Syrian Refugees and the Impact of Jordan's Economy This paper examines the impact refugees have on a host country's economy. The paper ana-
lyzes Jordan's economy prior to the civil war in Syria and analyzes the results of the influx of
Syrian refugees entering Jordan. Prior to the entry of Syrian refugees Jordan faced a weak
economy having high unemployment along with high poverty in specific governances. Once
the Syrians poured into Jordan the economy experienced a shock leading to an increase in
interest rates and inflation. As a result Jordan's unemployment rate increased and the pov-
erty intensified.
Santiago Mancheno—How Do Differences in the Quality of Primary Education of Respective Countries Affect
Their GDP Per Capita When Compared to Each Other? This paper discusses the importance of elementary education across different countries and analyzes the impact of im-
proved education in the long-term. In recent years, some countries have adopted certain policies that have boosted the qual-
ity of education. Hence, this has created a better economic situation for the country but more specifically, for the children
that have enjoyed the aforementioned benefits. Moreover, the paper addresses a key question regarding education: quantity
vs. quality. Recently, data has shown that more children are able to reach some level of education and in some cases, kids
have managed to graduate from – at least – high school. Nevertheless, some evidence, such as PISA and TIMSS, show that
the quality of education received is irregular and that several countries have surpassed the expected levels through innova-
tive procedures. Additionally, different conclusions are drawn from the empirical work: there should be an improvement in
teacher’s economic situation and also, an attempt to change the teacher’s social stigma in certain societies in order to recu-
perate previous educational situations. Finally, the importance of standardized tests is discussed as a valid way on measur-
ing children ability to learn and perform in different scenarios. Are standardized tests a good way to measure the quality of
education and in consequence, people’s economic situation in the long-term?
Letter to the Alumni
Dear Alumni—The best way to give back to your college and to get something in return is to mentor a
student. To this end, if any of you are in the position of needing an intern, we ask you to consider
offering an Internship to our current students in either the fall, spring or summer semesters.
Students can earn up to three credits per semester from an Internship. They need to work at least
120 hours and they can be paid or not. The office of Career Development can provide more
information. You may contact them at [email protected] or call (914) 323-5484. Thank you for
considering providing this important opportunity to our current students.
This newsletter has been written by Carolyn Greaige, Administrative Assistant, Department of Economics,
Finance and Management. Please send comments to [email protected]. Any suggestions on
what you would like to see in the newsletter or about how the department could improve are welcome.
Department Social
The department had their 4th Annual Department Social on
April 30th to thank the full-time and part-time faculty for all
their hard work and dedication to the college for the semester.
This year we invited the graduating seniors and juniors who
majored in the department. Everyone enjoyed themselves and
it was a nice chance for the whole department to come together
and talk about the previous semester as well as wish the gradu-
ating seniors good luck.
EFM Newsletter Page 11
Laura Bigaouette will be teach-
ing Introduction to Marketing
in the fall. Laura is the Assis-
tant Dean for Academic Affairs
at Manhattanville. She received
her MBA in International Mar-
keting at Pace University and
her BA in Russian History from
the University of Rochester.
John Dolan will be teaching
Corporation Finance in the fall.
Currently, John is an Independ-
ent Consultant for Second Or-
der Strategies. He received his
MBA in Finance at Wharton
Graduate Business School and
his BA in Economics/Math from
Union College.
Matthew Taylor will be teaching
Computer Concepts in the fall.
Matthew is a Test Administra-
tor for Department of the Army
as well as an adjunct instructor
for the School of Business. He
received his MS in Management
from the University of Mary-
land, UC and his BS in Interna-
tional Affairs from the United
States Air Force Academy.
New Adjuncts join the department
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