Pending approval from the State Board of Education, the newly designed programs will begin in fall 2012 when the new Micron Business and Economics Building opens. The fourth floor will be devoted exclusively to graduate business programs and includes new state-of-the-art classrooms, technology-enhanced team rooms and the Petersen-Hales Imagination Laboratory. Students may apply online now at http://cobe.boisestate.edu/graduate.

“A team of COBE faculty gathered information from the business community and prospective students and designed these new MBA programs,” said COBE Dean Patrick Shannon. “They will meet the needs of both employees in the local business community who want to complete an MBA by going part-time, and also recent, high-potential graduates from non-business undergraduate programs in the West who want to add an MBA to their resume by going full-time to Boise State University.”

“The updates to our program reflect the changing needs of the business community,” said Kirk Smith, associate dean for graduate business studies. “One MBA program cannot meet the needs of everyone looking for a business education today.”

Most traditional MBA programs require work experience for admission. However, the full-time Career Start MBA program is designed for recent graduates who may not have begun their careers. Classes will take place during the day and students will complete their degree in two years. Internships and real projects make it ideal for recent graduates who need business knowledge and experience in order to enter their desired career field.

All students accepted into the Career Start program will receive financial assistance. For more information about the program, contact Trisha Lamb at 426-1120, or trishastevenslamb@boisestate.edu.

The MBA track for working professionals is a sensibly paced evening program built around the theme of commercializing intellectual property. By attending night school over the course of 32 months, participants will gain the managerial skills needed to take their careers in a new direction.

The existing Executive MBA program rounds out the three offerings. Middle- to senior-level professionals gain the leadership, business, and innovation skills their organizations need on a schedule that minimizes work and personal life disruption. Boise State’s Executive MBA was launched in 2006 and focuses on creativity in the evaluation of business problems, an immediate link between class projects and work tasks, an integrated curriculum that takes into account a wide range of business units and a trade mission-style international experience in Vietnam.

College of Business and Economics professor Nancy Napier has been awarded Vietnam’s highest award for contributions to education in the Southeast Asian country.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training conferred the Medal of Honor on Napier during a special ceremony Nov. 18 in Hanoi, Vietnam, honoring her long-time work there, particularly at the National Economics University (NEU).

From 1994-2003, Napier led Boise State’s $8.5 million capacity building project at NEU, which involved delivering Boise State’s MBA to 84 participants, supporting more than 20 Vietnamese faculty members in other master’s and doctoral programs around the world, and helping to establish Vietnam’s first international standard business school in 1997.

“Many years ago, Nancy Napier had the inspiration to form a partnership between the College of Business and Economics and the country of Vietnam that would help that country begin to reshape its economy,” said Patrick Shannon, dean of Boise State’s College of Business and Economics. “What started out as an MBA opportunity for Vietnamese students has turned into a 20-year relationship with the country’s leaders. We are very proud of Nancy for her leadership and are thrilled that Vietnam has chosen to recognize her with this wonderful honor.”

Many Boise State Vietnam MBA graduates have become leaders in Vietnam’s business and government organizations, as well as within education. With Boise State’s support, the NEU started its own MBA programs in English and Vietnamese, and increased its other academic and outreach offerings. To date, the NEU Business School has trained more than 1,500 managers in its graduate and training programs that focus on doing business in a global economy.

The nine-year project involved more than 25 Boise State faculty members and administrators, more than 50 other faculty members from various countries around the world, and brought more than 100 Vietnamese to Boise to learn about education and doing business in a market economy. Many of them did internships at Boise organizations, including Boise Cascade, Hewlett-Packard, Nelson Construction, ECCO, the YMCA and the Idaho Statesman.

Boise State began the project before the United States and Vietnam re-established diplomatic relations in 1995 and continued long after. The project, funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (1993-2000) and USAID (2000-2003), represented USAID’s largest aid project in Vietnam at the time. It was featured on the front page of the Asian Wall Street Journal, in The New York Times and on NPR radio.

Since the project’s ending, when the NEU Business School was fully functional, Napier has continued to return periodically to Hanoi, where she teaches at the NEU, works with several business organizations started by Boise State MBAs and conducts research. The College of Business and Economics Executive MBA program does its international residency in Hanoi, which is organized by former Boise State MBAs who are now business leaders in Vietnam. In addition, several other Boise State College of Business and Economics professors continue their links with the National Economics University through teaching and research.

Napier has published several articles, many with colleagues who were Boise MBA graduates, and a book (“Managing in Transition Economies,” 2005) that draw from her experiences in Vietnam. Her most recent book, “Insight: Encouraging Aha Moments for Organizational Success,” has been translated into Vietnamese.

More at: http://www.vietnamica.net/vietnam-moet-honored-american-professors-for-significant-contribution/

To learn more about Gazieva and her efforts to promote the use of technology in business, see the article Muskies Moving Beyond ‘You’ve Got Mail’.

One-on-one executive coaching, individual mentoring from business leaders, peer-to-peer forums and seminars will provide the top 25 percent of current students and recent MBA graduates the opportunity to dramatically enhance their leadership skills. The new program will run monthly during the academic year, from September to May.

“Honors Track is the only program I know of in the Northwest that provides individual skill development for traditional MBA students,” said Kirk Smith, associate dean for graduate studies and executive education. “Our very best students will have the opportunity to become even more exceptional and that bodes well for the future economic health of our state.”

Selection will be limited to 12 participants this year. Current Boise State MBA students with a minimum grade point average of 3.5 may apply. The program also is open to MBA alumni from the past three years. The charge for the non-credit program is $900. Applications are due by Friday, August 13.

For an application or for more information, visit http://cobe.boisestate.edu/graduate and click on MBA Honors Track, or call (208) 426-1126.

Elevator Pitch Competition

Undergraduate Winners:

• First Place: Trevor Shepard for  Green Light Scheduling
• Second Place: Tyler Casperson and Tim Smith for Mouth Brush
• Third Place: Mariel Donoso, Kent Ownings, Lupe Gonzales, and Dustin Atkins for Instint

Graduate Winners:

• First Place: David Rush for WAW Green Ammonia
• Second Place: Kristin Bierle for Alzar School
• Third Place: Siddarth Dhanasekaran for Palmistry

Business Plan Competition

Undergraduate Winners:

• First Place: Shawn Phillips, Brittany Reed, Steven Schrader, and Alisher Siddikov for MyRoadTrip.com
• Second Place: Rachael Garner, Tyler Casperson, Ryan Underdahl, Timothy Smith, and Paul Greenfield for The Ledge
• Third Place: Jennifer Orr, Matt Jost, and Chase Lowther for BBL Built-in Bike Light

Graduate Winners:

• First Place: Michelle Sabick, Lisa Laajala, Mike Mercil, and Sara Gomez for Innovative Cardiology
• Second Place: Tim Perry, Jane Reed, Elizabeth Pearson, and Igor Zagorskiy for Accumulus
• Third Place: Andrew Smyth, Dean Hahn, Ellie Reese, and Thomas Shoeck for Scratch X

The Competitions and prizes were made possible through the generous sponsorship of Key Bank and United Heritage Insurance.

David’s team came in 3rd in the preliminary round of the 2009 Global Moot Corp Business Plan Competition losing out to a team that was a finalist in the competition. The Global Champion of the competition was Novophage Therapeutics, a team from Boston University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, that provides a novel approach to combat antibiotics-resistant infections by combining engineering bacteriophages with antibiotics. The Novophage team was made of an MD/PhD., a PhD and an MBA and took home $135,000 in prizes.

The other teams in the Benchmark Capital Challenge round included: Fluoptics has developed a patented system for intra-operative cancer imaging that simultaneously reduces the risk of remission and increases quality of life post-operation (E.M. Lyon, France), SOVAmed provides a means for assessing vascular diseases in radiological image data by means of computer-aided procedures as a distant service provider (Wissenschaftliche Hochschule fur Untemehmenffuhrung WHU, Germany) and Cee-bot allows people to interactively design robots via the internet and interactively telecontrol the actions of the robots with real-time visual feedback and other hepatic feedbacks (Chinese University of Hong Kong, China).

Thirty eight (38) teams from around the world competed in the 2009 Global Moot Corp Business Plan Competition. These included:

USA

• Boise State University
• Boston University
• Brigham Young University
• Carnegie Mellon University
• Colorado School of Mines
• Fayetteville State University
• Kennesaw State University
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Northwestern University
• San Diego State University
• University of Texas at Austin
• University of Texas at Dallas
• University of Arkansas
• University of California at Berkeley
• University of Chicago
• University of Louisville
• University of Michigan
• University of Oregon
• University of San Francisco
• University of Utah

Australia

• University of Adelaide (Australia)

Canada

• Queen’s University
• University of Manitoba
• University of Waterloo

China

• Chinese University of Hong Kong
• Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Columbia

• Pontifica Universidad Javeriana
• Universidad de los Andes

France

• E.M. Lyon

Germany

• Wissenschaftliche Hochschule fur Untemehmenffuhrung (WHU)

Great Britain

• London Business School
• University of Oxford

Mexico

• Centro de Investigacion en Materiales Avanzados

Norway

• Norwegian University of Science and Technology

Thailand

• Thammasat University

Governor Butch Otter will be the keynote speaker the induction ceremony to be held Wednesday, April 29 fro 6:00 – 7:00 p.m in the Grand B ballroom at the Student Union Building.

2009 Beta Gamma Sigma Program and list of inductees

Beta Gamma Sigma Background

Beta Gamma Sigma was established in 1913 and is the business equivalent of Phi Beta Kappa. Membership is the highest honor bestowed upon graduate and undergraduate business students.

Beta Gamma Sigma has inducted more than 605,000 outstanding students into membership since its founding in 1913. These 605,000 members have served in corporate, government, non-profit, educational, and other management positions at every level of responsibility. Members currently reside in all 50 U.S. states and more than 160 countries around the world.

The Society maintains an active database with more than 480,000 members’ mailing addresses and other information. In 2007-08, the Society inducted about 22,000 new members.

Beta Gamma Sigma has established 481 collegiate chapters in all 50 U.S. states and 18 countries and territories at schools accredited by AACSB International. Additionally, 20 alumni chapters serve the needs of alumni members in major metropolitan areas, including Hong Kong.

The eight student team consisted of: David Andrews, Sara Byrne, Jamie Chaffin, Lisa Frazier, Sarah Gridley, Kamile Ishiyama, Evan Nolevanko, and Jennifer Stemple.

The National Student Advertising Competition is the premier college advertising competition. It provides more than 3,000 college students with real-world experience by requiring a strategic advertising/marketing/media campaign for a corporate sponsor. Schools receiving first place from each district competition are selected to present their campaigns to a panel of industry executives at the American Advertising Federation National Conference.

This year’s corporate sponsor was, The Century Counsel, a group of distillers fighting drunk driving and underage drinking. This year’s mission was to create a campaign targeted towards college students to help combat the binge drinking problem that is so prevalent on college campuses today. Boise State accomplished this with the “Retool Your Reality” Campaign, which communicates a disconnect between student perceptions and reality.

Judges, who were advertising executives from around the west, were thoroughly impressed with the “Retool Your Reality” Campaign, and the difference between 1st and 2nd place (Portland State and Boise State) was within a point. Congratulations to the team and their astounding performance!

Contact Information: For more information, please contact the College of Business and Economics Marketing Department at 426-5384.

Boise State Center for Entrepreneurship held the first annual Elevator Pitch Competition and the results were impressive. The ideas generated by Boise State graduate and undergraduate students impressed the panel of judges with both their innovation and viability. Over $3,500 was awarded for graduate and undergraduate categories in best technology, most green, most viable and best presentation.  Before the event, entrepreneur and Boise State alumnus Clay Young, co-founder of Inovus Solar and ProClarity, discussed challenges for entrepreneurs.

For the complete Elevator Pitch Competition results click on: Boise State Elevator Pitch Competition 2009 Results

To view the Idaho Statesman article on the Elevator Pitch Competition click here.

Photo Gallery

This year’s honorees are:

Boise – Denise Buske, Human Resource Management; Amanda Clausen, Accountancy Taxation; Jon Daley, Masters of Business Administration; Maria Shimel, Management; Daniel Simenc, Management; Erin Taylor, Information Technology; Steve Wargo, Accountancy; Mark Woychick, Masters of Business Administration

Bonners Ferry – Johanna Farrell, International Business

Meridian – Melissa Warwick, Finance

Idaho Falls – Jake Davis, Entrepreneurship; and Jason Davis, Supply Chain Management

Payette – Jennifer Stemple, Marketing

Twin Falls – Jeff Woods, Masters of Science in Accountancy

For more information about Boise State’s College of Business and Economics and its programs, call (208) 426-4950 or visit http://cobe.boisestate.edu.

Contact: Sherry Squires, University Communications, (208) 426-1563, ssquires@boisestate.edu