Kudos

The School of Management’s chapter of Beta Alpha Psi was recognized once again as one of the best in the world, receiving a number of special honors and awards at the organization’s annual meeting held recently in Anaheim, Calif.

Beta Alpha Psi (BAP) is an international honors organization for financial information students and professionals.

The School of Management’s Zeta Theta chapter received the KPMG Gold Chapter award, an honor bestowed on only 12 chapters out of the 315 worldwide. The award is given to chapters that continually demonstrate and exemplify the highest values of BAP: leadership, scholastic success, lifelong learning and development, service and ethical behavior.

“This is the fifth consecutive year we have received the KPMG Gold Chapter award,” says Kathleen Nesper, assistant professor of accounting and law and chapter adviser. “It’s a great example of the commitment our students and faculty have to excel in all areas of academic life.”

Zeta Theta also was recognized as a top Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) chapter again this year. Through VITA, IRS-certified accounting students from the School of Management provide free tax-preparation services each spring to individuals and families with annual incomes below $50,000.

In addition, the chapter’s best practice team competed and earned first place in the inspiration category at the meeting. The team had earned first place at the regional competition held in March in Alexandria, Va.

UB doctoral students Dane Marco Di Cesare and Sandra Gothard have been named to the first class of SUNY student fellows who will work with system leadership over the next year to shape the system’s use of “big data” to transform the student experience.

The fellows was announced by SUNY Chancellor Nancy L. Zimpher at SUNY’s third annual “Critical Issues in Higher Education” conference in New York City.

The year’s conference theme, “Building a Smarter University: Big Data, Innovation and Ingenuity,” brought together international experts and thought leaders to examine how the emergence of big data can help higher education improve the student learning experience, enhance research, maximize resources, support effective community outreach, strengthen the education pipeline and advance university infrastructure.

“The ability to manage and accurately analyze data is a skill that is increasingly important in today’s marketplace,” said Zimpher. “Learning from experts from across the globe at this week’s conference, the SUNY student fellows will play a critical role in helping SUNY to educate and prepare future generations of students for this challenge.

“Selected by their campus provosts for this designation, our student fellows have each shown an interest in and capacity for using big data to enhance their academic and professional pursuits, and we are proud to partner with them as we determine the best uses for big data in the future of higher education.”

Di Cesare and Gothard join six other fellows whose interests span the disciplines of health care, computer science, communication, finance, math and education.

Di Cesare is a third-year doctoral scholar pursuing a degree in special education. He is the recipient of the Leadership Grant—Preparing Leaders of Tomorrow to Work in a Digital Age. His research interests involve developing digital tools to increase writing achievement for students with learning disabilities.

He is in the process of earning two advanced certificates: a statistical analysis certificate from the Department of Counseling and Educational Psychology, and a certificate of new literacies from the Department of Learning and Instruction, both in the Graduate School of Education.

Di Cesare has presented at state and national conferences, co-authored a publication in the April 2013 issue of the Journal of Special Education Technology, co-authored two publications awaiting review and is currently preparing three manuscripts for publication.

Gothard is a second-year doctoral student in the School of Nursing. Her professional career began in perioperative nursing at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, affiliated with Northwestern University. She currently is regional administrative director of perioperative services at Bassett Medical Center in Cooperstown.

The Bassett Healthcare Network system, ranked one of the top 100 most-integrated systems in the nation, offers all specialties and phases of care, and has more than 400 full-time providers in an employed model that includes six hospitals, including Bassett Medical Center; the Bassett-Columbia University Medical School; and the Bassett Research Institute.

Gothard’s research interests include exploring the extent to which sociodemographic and psychosocial factors could influence the state of obesity in the rural, female, adult population.

The School of Management’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership (CEL) has been named a Top 100 Champion in the 2013 Small Business Influencer Awards by Small Business Trends.

The Small Business Influencer Awards honor those who are influential to small businesses in North America through the products, services, knowledge, information or support they provide to the small business market.

The CEL is being recognized for promoting business growth through leadership development and experiential learning, enhancing the management abilities of business leaders and building new business relationships through an expanded network of contacts.

In 2012, the CEL received an honorable mention as a Small Business Influencer.

“The CEL is here to promote and help small businesses succeed,” says Thomas Ulbrich, assistant dean and CEL executive director. “It’s an honor for the entire CEL team to be recognized once again by Small Business Trends.”

Other notable 2013 Top 100 Champions include Samsung, Paychex and FedEx Office.

The Small Business Influencer Awards initiative is produced by Small Business Trends, an award-winning, online publication serving more than 6 million small business owners, stakeholders and entrepreneurs annually, and SmallBizTechnology.com, a media company that produces online content and live events educating small and mid-sized companies on how to strategically use technology as a tool to grow their businesses.

Established in 1987, the CEL provides participants with individualized and interactive education in entrepreneurship. More than 1,200 CEL alumni employ more than 22,000 Western New Yorkers, and their businesses are worth more than $2 billion to the local economy.

Amy Gancarz, a postdoctoral associate at UB’s Research Institute on Addictions (RIA), was honored for her work during the Seventh Annual Neuroscience Research Day held at UB’s Clinical and Translational Research Center on Sept. 27.

Gancarz received the first-place Beverly Bishop Poster Award in the event’s poster session for her research outlining how cocaine use and withdrawal can alter the molecular structure of the brain. Her poster was chosen as the best from the more than 40 presented that day.

Neuroscience Research Day, sponsored by the Buffalo Chapter of the Society for Neuroscience, was held concurrently with RIA’s conference on “Neuroscience Research on Substance Abuse.” More than 60 researchers from across SUNY attended the conference and several UB scientists made presentations, including Gancarz’s mentor, David Dietz, and Caroline Bass, both of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, and Samir Haj-Dahmane, senior research scientist at RIA.  

RIA’s postdoctoral research training program was established in 2000 through a grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The program provides quality training to prepare scientists to conduct addictions research.