Engage@Spears

@SPEARS

ENGAGE

The official magazine of Spears School of Business

RISING ABOVE THE CHALLENGE

SPEARS BUSINESS SENIORS LIKE CHANDLER GOODMAN OVERCOME THE HURDLES OF A GLOBAL PANDEMIC

SPEARS SCHOOL OF BUSINESS

MENTORING PROGRAM

Our mentoring program provides an OPPORTUNITY for ALUMNI and friends to interact with Spears Business students. The goal of the program is for mentors to provide CAREER ADVICE, ENHANCE PROFESSIONALISM, and BETTER PREPARE their protégé for transition from academia to the business environment. Being a mentor doesn’t require much of your time and it’s easy to sign up!

I cannot IMAGINE not being a mentor – it’s a volunteer OPPORTUNITY like no other!

– Program Mentor

To find out how you can make an impact as a mentor, email us at ssmp@okstate.edu or visit us online at business.okstate.edu/mentoring-program

The Cowboy Family comes together when times are tough. The impact of the historic COVID-19 pandemic is far reaching, and still growing. OSU students and their families need our help now more than ever as requests for emergency funding and scholarships for those in need continue to climb.

If you are interested in supporting Spears Business students in need, please contact: Julie Antis, Senior Director of Development, Spears School of Business OSU Foundation | 918.594.8590 | jantis@OSUgiving.com You can change a student’s life with your support. Visit OSUgiving.com for more information.

LETTER FROM THE DEAN

GREETINGS, We hope this edition finds you safe and well. As I write this, we are putting the finishing touches on a spring semester of virtual education and work. Our students, staff and faculty have done a tremendous job of adapting to these changes, and I am immensely proud of them. Some faculty have found innovative ways to educate students, while others have taught online for the very first time. Our staff has used all the technological tools available to keep our college functioning. Students have bravely dealt with the disappointment of a drastically changed college experience.

While COVID-19 has presented us with many challenges, we have risen to them, and we want to share with you some examples of how we have adapted and persevered. These stories will give you a glimpse of how life at Spears Business and the business of education changed in mid-March. I think you will be impressed with the professionalism and dedication displayed by everyone here.

We also bring you “non-virus” related stories in this edition. Cindy Crenshaw-Martin is a nontraditional student who, despite injuries from a bombing many years ago, has shown tremendous grit in earning a business degree at age 61. You will be amazed at her personal journey and understand why she is one of my new heroes.

Our profiles of the Power of Personal, featuring advisor Coleman Hickman, professor Dr. Goutam Chakraborty and student and Spears Ambassador Caroline Riley, are great examples of how the Power of Personal is more than just a slogan here at Spears. It is a sense of purpose and mission for us and permeates all that we do.

We bring you stories about female groundbreakers such as Betty Hove, OSU’s first female MBA graduate; Patricia Ann Tilford, a black business student who attended OSU only a few years after racial integration, and Mary Logan, the college’s second female finance graduate. We are grateful for the courage they displayed. They are an inspiration for our continued commitment to diversity and inclusion.

We look forward to our new normal and the time when we get to see you again.

OSU Spears School of Business Dean

Ken Eastman Associate Deans

Carol Johnson and Marlys Mason Vice Dean, Watson Graduate School of Management

Ramesh Sharda Spears School Marketing and Communications Blake Brasor, Brooke Dann, Grace Hentges, Jeff Joiner, Emily Long, Lance Shaw, Caitlin Shogren and Terry Tush Magazine Editor: Dorothy L. Pugh Art Director: Valerie Kisling Photography: Jeff Joiner, Gary Lawson, Lance Shaw, Phil Shockley, Caitlin Shogren Spears School Department Heads Lee Adkins, Economics Bruce Barringer, School of Entrepreneurship Tom Brown, School of Marketing and International Business Audrey Gramling, School of Accounting Li Miao, Hospitality and Tourism Management Jim Pappas, Management Betty Simkins, Finance Rick L. Wilson, Management Science and Information Systems Contact Spears School of Business Oklahoma State University 370 Business Building Stillwater, OK 74078-4011 405-744-5064 ssb.news@okstate.edu business.okstate.edu

ALL THE BEST,

Dr. Ken Eastman Dean, Spears School of Business

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Oklahoma State University, in compliance with Title VI and VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Executive Order 11246 as amended, and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (Higher Education Act), the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, and other federal and state laws and regulations, does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, genetic information, sex, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, disability, or status as a veteran, in any of its policies, practices or procedures. This provision includes, but is not limited to admissions, employment, financial aid, and educational services. The Director of Equal Opportunity, 408 Whitehurst, OSU, Stillwater, OK 74078-1035; Phone 405-744-5371; email: eeo@okstate.edu has been designated to handle inquiries regarding non-discrimination policies. Any person (student, faculty, or staff) who believes that discriminatory practices have been engaged in based on gender may discuss his or her concerns and file informal or formal complaints of possible violations of Title IX with OSU’s Title IX Coordinator 405-744-9154. This publication, issued by Oklahoma State University as authorized by Office of the dean, Spears School of Business, was printed by Royle Printing at a cost of $8,155.10 7.2M /Jun/20. #8419

TABLE OF CONTENTS

4

On the Cover Spears Business faculty members and students rise above the challenges presented by the COVID 19 global pandemic.

(Cover photo by Phil Shockley)

38 4

12

26

For the Love of Marketing

Serious About His Success

30

Elise Wade always takes her marketing education with her, from the football field to the bullfighting sideline.

Taking Education Personally

44 Research

18

54 12

Celebrating Groundbreakers

Triumph Over Tragedy

The Challenges of Going First

53

Top Spears Business Senior

56 Retirements

Three OSU business alumna who overcame naysayers and societal expectations to be the first in their areas.

34

48

60

Memories Burn Bright

62 Briefs

74 18

Nontraditional student Cindy Crenshaw-Martin traveled a difficult road to earn her bachelor’s degree from Spears Business this spring.

34 74

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COVID -19 PANDEMIC

Rolling with the Changes Spears Business faculty pivot to suddenly adapt to online teaching

Dr. Bryan Brockbank

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STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS

D

r. Bryan Brockbank and his family were looking forward to a spring break trip to St. Louis to visit relatives and tour some historic church sites in the area. The family had planned the trip for months, and anticipation was building with less than 48 hours before they were to depart. But all of that changed on March 12.

On that Thursday, spring break plans changed for nearly everyone. Oklahoma State University announced that all classes would be held online the two weeks after spring break because of the coronavirus pandemic. Instead of departing for a week of relaxation and rejuvenation, many faculty members began to make other plans.

Just six days later — Wednesday, March 18 — it was announced that classes would be taught virtually for the remainder of the spring semester.

Students would not be returning to campus after spring break, and the May commencement would be postponed until December.

Brockback, his wife, Sarah, and two kids decided to stay home, and his focus quickly turned to preparing to teach online courses for the first time. An assistant professor of accounting in his third year as a full-time instructor, Brockback was teaching two Intermediate Accounting I courses in face-to-face classes on the Stillwater campus.

While many in Spears Business were already teaching online, this was a first for Brockbank, who spent much of his spring break figuring out how to teach nearly 150 students virtually. He began recording classroom videos to share with the students, eventually recording more than 50 videos for his classes. Brockbank’s time management skills were put to the test over the final seven weeks of the semester.

“It’s a huge time commitment, but I care about these kids. I want them to be successful and I want them to learn,” Brockbank said. “The easy way out would be to say it’s just too hard to cover these concepts, so let’s get rid of this assignment, this project and this exam, and we’ll just make it easier on everybody so there’s less stress during this time.

In my mind, that’s the easy way out. That may feel good to them in the short term, but in the long term it’s doing them a disservice.

“I want them to learn the material because they need to know this material. Not all of my students are going to take the CPA exam but a good portion of them are, and the material I’m covering right now is on the CPA exam, and they need to know it. I can’t sacrifice that quality because I know that it’s important for them and for their careers.”

For his first week online, Brockbank kept his office hours unchanged at the originally scheduled

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four and a half hours. But when he didn’t hear from a single student, he adjusted.

“I thought this is a waste of bandwidth, a waste of time, so by the end of the week, I decided I don’t have office hours anymore. I told them to contact me whenever it’s convenient for them,” said Brockbank, who began answering emails and video calls from students as early as 8 a.m. and continuing throughout the day, sometimes as late as 10 p.m.

“I care about them. I want them to be successful.

I want them to learn the material, and if that’s the case, then I can’t be limited and say I’m only available for two hours on Monday and two hours on Wednesday,” he said.

Brockbank is just one of many Spears Business faculty who have gone above and beyond to ensure students were successful in navigating the unchartered territory of virtual learning.

“All my professors have been great. They respond to all my emails right away if I have questions,” said Gracie Szakin, a hospitality and tourism management senior who finished her degree in May. “They put up different discussions and were doing Zoom calls just to talk with us.

They understand that it’s really difficult, so they’re being really gracious when it comes to different things. And they’ve done a good job of making it go online without it being overwhelming or no work at all. They’ve done a really good job, and I’m really thankful for that.”

Dr. Rick Wilson taught the first business school online class at OSU in 1992, the quantitative methods course in the MBA program. The head of the Department of Management Science and Information Systems teaches three classes each semester, one face-to-face and two online, so the March announcement was not as shocking to him as it was to Brockbank.

“There are still a lot of misconceptions even today about online education, including you can’t learn as much, but I’d say you can learn more,” Wilson said. “You can replay the video showing the faculty member solving problems, and that’s what I teach, a problem-solving class. You can replay me over and over again, and that’s a good thing, compared to having to catch everything I do in class at that very moment in a face-to-face class.”

Wilson said that although the delivery method is different, the objective is the same whether students are learning in the Business Building with the instructor standing in front of them or at home looking at computer screens.

“The importance of it goes back to how I approach an online class,” he said. “The first thing you have to do is build those relationships

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with students so that they know you’re going to be committed to their success, which means you’re going to convince them that what they’re learning is worthwhile and useful and practical, that you’re on their team. That’s why they call me ‘Coach,’ because that’s the way I approach teaching. I’m a facilitator, I’m a coach, not up on my soapbox passing down lightning bolts of wisdom. I’m helping them develop their skills so that they can go out and be successful.”

Dr. Joe Byers drew up a continuity plan for Martin Midstream Partners several years ago when he was employed there, and he saw the need to create learning materials online after moving into the higher education world. The Department of Finance faculty member is comfortable teaching online classes but moving three face-to-face upper-level courses online in a week was more of a challenge than he expected.

The assistant professor of professional practice was teaching four finance classes in the spring (three face-to-face and one online) when the decision to go virtual was announced.

“Transitioning three classes to fully online has not gone quite as smoothly as I thought it would go. It has had some challenges,” he said at the time.

“Zoom has been a godsend. Without Zoom, I don’t know how this would have worked.”

Byers, like Brockbank and Wilson, adjusted his schedule to make himself available to assist his students. “I told them that I’ll answer the phone

Dr. Rick Wilson

“The importance of it goes back to how I approach an online class. The first thing you have to do is build those relationships with students, so that they know you're going to be committed to their success ... that you’re on their team.” ­— DR. RICK WILSON

later at night if need be, just because I know the situation we are all in,” he said.

“To be honest with you, I think the students have adapted well,” Byers said. “They have their support groups, and they have their family and friends from back home that have provided them with what they need as far as all the support they need to get through this.”

But Spears Business faculty continue to show that the Power of Personal is more than just words — it’s how they treat and interact with students.

“This has shown that we can adapt, we can sustain and we can move forward,” Byers said.

“It’s been a different Power of Personal, and I don’t think that’s changed; we just adapted to teaching online.”

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COVID -19 PANDEMIC

Dealing With Disarray Spears Business seniors handle an unprecedented final semester with poise

Gracie Szakin

Caroline Riley

“My mother, the great mother that she is, hugged me and said, ‘Five years down the line, this will be something that you can tell everybody about. You will always be the Class of 2020.’” ­— CHANDLER GOODMAN

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STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS

G

racie Szakin had few concerns in early March.

She was midway through her final semester at Oklahoma State University, preparing to put the final touches on the relatively easy 13-hour semester she had orchestrated so she would be able to spend extra time with friends.

The 21-year-old was looking forward to flying to Los Angeles over spring break to visit her brother, Zach. And, probably best of all, she had a job waiting for her after walking across the Gallagher-

Chandler Goodman Iba Arena stage at commencement May 9.

But by April 15, the hospitality and tourism management major’s world had crumbled, just like those of Chandler Goodman, Caroline Riley and approximately 1,000 other Spears School of Business seniors whose lives were turned upside down by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

OSU announced March 12 — just days before Szakin was planning to board a flight to Los Angeles — that classes would be taught virtually for two weeks following spring break. Then, six days later on March 18, OSU officials said classes would be taught online for the rest of the spring semester.

Students were only allowed back on campus to move out of their dorms and apartments.

It was almost incomprehensible to Szakin and the Class of 2020 that their college careers would

be ending from the living rooms of their parents’ homes.

“It’s been a wild ride,” she said, describing some of her challenges: • Three of her four classes (one already online) were moved to being taught virtually.

• She canceled her spring break trip to Los Angeles.

• She moved home to live with her parents.

• She missed out on the final two months of her senior year in Stillwater, including attending the Craft Beer Forum of Oklahoma, participating in several big events in her role with the Student Union Activities Board, spending time with her friends, and, of course, commencement.

• Her job offer as a revenue management analyst with Kriya RevGEN, a hotel management company in Grapevine, Texas, had been rescinded. The company wants to eventually hire her, but it will wait to see how the hospitality industry recovers following the pandemic.

“It would have been perfect. I had ended up picking out an apartment to be near my mom and dad,” she said. “Little did I know, I’d be even closer to them than that — actually living with them. I’ve been back on the job hunt. I love the hospitality industry and am excited to see what future opportunities will be available.”

Like Szakin, Riley had to return home. The Spears Business marketing graduate from Amarillo, Texas, spent the final months of her college experience in virtual classes from her parents’ dining room table, sitting across from her younger sister, Georgia, a sophomore at Texas A&M. She began her job in supply chain marketing in June with BNSF Railroad.

“I’m so thankful that I have a job because I know a lot of my friends don’t, and they are pretty worried,” she said.

Despite getting to spend more time with her tight-knit family before beginning her job, Riley was disappointed in all that she didn’t get to experience in Stillwater over the final weeks of college. She missed final events with her Alpha Chi Omega sorority sisters, participating in several Spears Ambassador service projects, assisting

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 9

at Our Daily Bread food pantry in Stillwater and spending time with friends.

She hopes to be in Stillwater for the rescheduled December commencement exercises for the Class of 2020, but it may not be possible that soon after starting a new job. “I’m going to try my best to come back in December,” Riley said.

Goodman, who graduated with a finance degree, says returning to OSU for commencement is going to be a priority.

“I definitely will be walking in December because I want to have that ceremony for my memories moving forward,” he said. “I was afraid that I was not going to have a graduation, that we’d have some sort of virtual ceremony, which is great and all, but man, I went through four years of college to get a virtual degree? That’s not what I wanted.”

As with the other seniors, Goodman was not prepared to move back to his family’s home in Oklahoma City in mid-March.

“It’s not the ending of my college career that I had hoped for but then again, what are you going to do? This is where we’re at, and unfortunately this is the card that’s been dealt, and I’m not complaining because there are a lot more people in this world right now that are having a lot tougher time than just taking a few online classes.”

Goodman has gone to work handling the financial operations and managing Alta Mere Window Tinting and Paint Protection Film in Oklahoma City, owned and operated by his family.

He was helping while finishing up school when the business shut down on March 26 following Gov. Kevin Stitt’s orders for all non-essential businesses to close.

Not one to sit idle while finishing up three online classes in the spring, Goodman and neighbor John-Crawford Counts, a graduating senior at Delta State University in Mississippi, partnered to open Pop-Up Pantry Oklahoma City.

Counts’ father works for food industry distributor Sysco, which teamed up with restaurants and other businesses during the shutdown to sell Sysco products directly to consumers.

Goodman was determined to make the best of the circumstances.

“Anybody who wants to come up to me and say, ‘Chandler, I’m so sorry,’ or ‘Chandler, this is terrible, and I can’t imagine what you’re going through’ — you’re right, this is not ideal,” he said. “I’m not enjoying this but in the grand reality, there are people who are losing their loved ones right now.

There are people who are losing their jobs because

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of this. There are people whose lives have been turned completely upside down because of this.

“The thing I keep telling myself and what I want everybody to know, if I can use my voice for anything, is that we will get through this and that this is just a small speed bump on the road of life.”

Goodman’s attitude is one that will help him succeed when he faces other obstacles.

“My mother, the great mother that she is, hugged me and said, ‘Five years down the line, this will be something that you can tell everybody about. You will always be the Class of 2020.’ All of us who are graduating in 2020 will have this sort of bond because of our schooling being cut short.

“I can’t wait until five or 10 years down the line when I’m sitting down with my friends and being able to say, ‘Hey, that was crazy, but we got through it and here we are. It was just a small speed bump along the road.’ That is something that has given me comfort. We’ll be able to look back and know we made it through this.”

Caroline Riley studies from her parents’ home in Amarillo, Texas, with help from her dogs.

Gracie Szakin at OSU before the pandemic.

Chandler Goodman and John-Crawford Counts opened the Pop-Up Pantry in Oklahoma City to help residents during the crisis.

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Dr. Bryan Brockbank

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STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTO BRUCE WATERFIELD/OSU ATHLETICS

FROM COVERING EXTREME BULLFIGHTING TO LEADING OSU SPIRIT, ELISE WADE PERSONIFIES MARKETING

I

t’s good that Elise Wade is not the least bit squeamish. Someone has a few broken ribs, no big deal. A cracked collarbone that needs emergency surgery, nothing she can’t handle. A three-inch gash over the eye that’s going to require several stitches, she won’t blink an eye. How about a broken arm dangling at a person’s side? May as well be a hang nail.

It takes more than a few broken ribs or a bloody cut to distract the sideline reporter for Bullfighters Only, an extreme sport where freestyle bullfighters spend 60 seconds dodging, jumping and avoiding aggressive Spanish fighting bulls. While many OSU students spend their weekends on campus, the Spears School of Business senior is often traveling across the country to work the next Bullfighters Only event.

Just this last year, she traveled from coast to coast with tour stops in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, California and Washington, and she was scheduled to travel to Hawaii for an event in April before it was canceled.

“Bullfighters Only is extreme. It’s one of the coolest things I’ve had the opportunity to do,” Wade said. “You may see a few cowboy hats, but you are not at a rodeo. It’s loud, it’s intense and for 60 seconds at a time the bullfighter and the bull are basically kind of dancing.”

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Bullfighters can be awarded up to 50 points for style, control and difficulty while maneuvering around and jumping over the bull, and the bull can be awarded up to 50 points based on his aggression, quickness and willingness to remain engaged with the fighter.

Similar to a television sideline reporter interviewing a football coach on the field after a game, Wade waits for the bullfighter to complete a round before interviewing him.

“They’re sweaty, and they’ll throw their arm around me,” she said. “I’m trying to interview them, and I can see blood dripping from their face, and they’re like, ‘Oh, it’s fine. I’m good.

I’ll just get some water here in a minute.’”

And, as Wade has witnessed, the sport is dangerous.

“You get used to seeing people get hit really hard, and seeing people get knocked out and people’s jaws being broken,” she said. “They call freestyle bullfighting the last of the gladiator sports, and that’s exactly what it is. These guys crave the adrenaline, they look chaos in the face and can control it. They love their job.”

Growing up on her family’s horse training farm north of Enid, Oklahoma, Wade is no stranger to working with animals more than 10 times her weight. She was on a horse before she was a year old, and she grew up showing horses and riding in competitions before eventually getting into barrel racing.

“I’ve been riding horses longer than I’ve been walking. I grew up on the back of a horse,” she said. “(My dad) was training horses about the same time I was born, and I was thrown on one not very long after coming home from the hospital. I was living every little girl’s dream — I had ponies everywhere.

“My very first pony I got when I was a little less than six months old. My dad found her when I was about six weeks old, and he said to my mom, ‘Sandra, we’re getting that one for her.’

Her name was Tootie Fruity.”

But upon arriving in Stillwater as an OSU freshman in 2016, Wade was hoping to live out a cowgirl’s dream — becoming the OSU Spirit Rider, the one student chosen each year to ride Bullet, the black horse that serves as the school’s mascot. Since 1984, the Spirit Rider brings Cowboys fans to their feet, riding Bullet onto the field at Boone Pickens Stadium to celebrate each OSU touchdown.

She was selected as the Spirit Rider for the 2017 football season.

“Being the Spirit Rider is an honor, to say the least,” she said.

“One of the reasons that I wanted to come to Oklahoma State University was someday I wanted to ride Bullet. For horse kids, that’s what they want, that’s what they think about.

“It’s so much more than sitting on this black horse that everyone knows as Bullet … it stands for everything that’s good about Oklahoma State University.”

Leading the 1,100-pound black beauty through the OSU Cowboy Marching Band as 60,000 people cheer wildly just minutes before the Cowboys football team enters the stadium is a thrill, she says. But there are other responsibilities, which Wade says are just as important, if not more so.

“There’s something about it that I didn’t fully comprehend until I took the field the very first game and got to sit there and talk to the fans, little kids, some of the football players and

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PHOTOS COURTESY ELISE WADE

Elise Wade takes pride in her job with Bullfighters Only, interviewing the competitors after they complete fighting some of the nation’s top bulls.

grandparents,” she said. “One of the main things I tried to remember is I wanted to be everything that these people expected, plus more.

“It’s not about you, it’s not about the Spirit Rider.

At that point you just get to be along for the ride.

You just get to pilot this ship, but that black horse means a lot to a lot of people. To understand who he is and what he stands for is the biggest job.”

Through her connections with the rodeo world, Wade has spent the last few years also working for companies such as Wrangler, Justin Boots, Cavender’s and Ride TV. She was in Las Vegas as a representative for Wrangler near the end of her yearlong stint as the Spirit Rider when she was approached by Bullfighters Only and offered the job as the sideline reporter.

She is most recognized by Bullfighters Only fans from her work as the sideline reporter, a job she’s had for the past two years, but she also has branched out into other areas with the company.

Wade’s focus is still on interviewing participants, but she’s also now assisting with marketing, including corporate sponsorships, social media and other avenues.

The 22-year-old Oklahoman’s passion is marketing, and it shows when she talks about Bullfighters Only, Wrangler or her year as the Spirit Rider.

“With marketing you’re learning how to sell products, you’re selling an idea, you’re selling yourself,” she said, “and if you can put all of those things together you can walk into any job interview or different industry and show you are capable and prepared.

“Everything I’ve learned as a marketing student here at Oklahoma State University has gone into what I do on a daily basis. Whether I am speaking to a major corporation about sponsorships for the company I work for or event that I’m being contracted to work for, I’m using the skills that Oklahoma State University has taught me.”

Wade says balancing her school workload while traveling for work has been challenging but with the help of Samantha Lancaster, her advisor in the Chesapeake Energy Business Student Success Center, and Spears Business faculty it has been manageable.

“The Spears School of Business has been really good to me,” she said. “Here at OSU they want to prepare you for going into life as an adult and the things you’re going to do, and to help you cultivate and create these goals and ambitions that you have — they want to help you achieve them.”

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Riding High on Bubble Calm Launch Student startup takes off despite changing directions and a pandemic

Y

ou would think that the two Oklahoma State University students who started a business selling a gum that promotes feelings of calmness would have done well at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic with all the fear surrounding it. But like nearly every business in the U.S. caught up in the crisis, the founders of startup Bubble Calm ran into all kinds of hitches following their launch on the last day of February 2020.

Spears School of Business students Will Petty and Walt Bowser have actually faced much more difficult times getting their calming gum Bubble

Walt Bowser (left) and Will Petty taste test their product.

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Calm formulated and their business plan implemented in the three years they’ve been at it. Nevertheless, despite countless gum recipes and coronavirus mayhem, the friends agree the effort has been worth it: The young entrepreneurs created a product with a growing customer base and successfully raised money to launch their company. How many college seniors can say that?

“Right now, we’re making a lot of gum and taking orders, but we’re learning that it’s hard to create a marketing plan because we haven’t been able to find out what works, and COVID has so many people scared,” said Petty, a senior accounting major. Bowser graduated this spring with a bachelor’s degree in economics.

The February launch party for Bubble Calm at the ConocoPhillips OSU Alumni Center included the introduction of a new look for the gum’s packaging and a new website. The party was a high point for Bower and Petty, who have worked an incalculable number of hours to see their dream become a reality.

The partners are longtime friends who grew up in Stillwater and were OSU roommates. They dreamed of starting their own business and creating a product that people needed. Knowing that a growing percentage of people suffer from anxiety and based on their own experiences, the two devised a recipe for a gum that uses natural ingredients that target receptors in

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS JEFF JOINER AND COURTESY BUBBLE CALM

the central nervous system to reduce hyperactivity and promote feelings of relaxation and reduce stress — Bubble Calm.

While Petty and Bowser worked with food scientists at OSU’s Food and Agricultural Products Center to formulate the gum, they also worked with Spears Business faculty member Kyle Eastham on a business plan.

Eastham is executive in residence and an instructor in the School of Entrepreneurship who works with OSU students with ideas for businesses.

Eastham said he hears lots of ideas, but probably more important than the idea itself is the person behind the idea.

“There are a lot of factors that make a startup successful,” Eastham said. “One of the biggest depends on how hard you

want to work. Will and Walt have put the work in and stuck with it for years.

That’s what most people don’t see.”

The pair and Eastham won the undergraduate category of the 2019 Love’s Entrepreneur Cup, a statewide collegiate business plan competition, including a cash prize $20,000. Bubble Calm also won $25,000 in 2019 from the Riata Center for Entrepreneurship PreSeed Fund for proof-of-concept startup capital.

The Bubble Calm entrepreneurs have had to work through challenges, including a strategic shift in the gum’s development. Their concept was to create and market the gum as a product made with all-natural ingredients, but customers didn’t like the taste.

“They wisely talked to customers and the feedback they got was that customers were more interested in the calming effects than whether or not it has natural ingredients,” Eastham said.

To improve the taste, the partners turned to Taste Tech, a United Kingdom company that specializes in flavorings and ingredients for food products. The company came back with several ideas.

Bowser and Petty, who make all of the gum themselves, tried new sweeteners and other ingredients and followed advice for changing its preparation to protect the flavor.

“Just making the gum one time like they told us, and it was perfect,” said Petty.

One thing Petty and Bowser didn’t count on was COVID-19. The entrepreneurs are making the best of the situation and are learning by trial and error. With wholesale distribution on hold, Bubble Calm relied almost entirely on online sales, which were encouraging.

“But right now, people are afraid to buy products online and have them shipped to their homes that have been touched by other people,” Bowser said.

“We are seeing that when people buy the product, they buy a whole bunch of it.”

LEARN MORE To learn more about Bubble Calm, visit bubblecalm.net. For information about the School of Entrepreneurship, visit business. okstate.edu/entrepreneurship.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 17

SPEARS GROUNDBREAKERS

Betty Murrell Hove

Patricia Tilford

Mary Logan

THREE WHO

SHOWED THE WAY We often celebrate visionaries and groundbreakers who stand their ground in the face of opposition and adversity. This story package introduces us to three women who attended Oklahoma State University at times when respect and inclusiveness were not equally offered to all people. These OSU business alumna overcame the naysayers and dated societal expectations for women to become groundbreakers. They graduated when opportunities for women in business were increasing, but not all Americans were ready to accept the change. And one of our featured alumna faced uncertainty because of her race as well as her gender.

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Betty Murrell Hove

Vision and Determination FIRST WOMAN TO EARN AN OSU MBA Betty Murrell Hove arrived on Oklahoma State University’s campus as a business student in 1960.

She gave no thought to being a groundbreaker or an inspiration for future students, but through her determination and strength of personality, that’s exactly would happen a few years later when she became the first woman at OSU to earn a Master’s of Business Administration degree.

“It was nice after graduating from high school to find myself in college, where I was encouraged to be my own person,” Hove said. “OSU encouraged us to find our own way.”

From the southwestern Oklahoma town of Altus, Hove followed her father’s path to OSU — or Oklahoma A&M College as it was known when Ray Murrell studied agriculture. Her brother and sister also went to OSU as did her husband, Larry Hove, who earned three degrees in civil engineering. The married couple graduated together in August 1964 when Betty, at age 21, received her MBA and Larry, 25, his engineering doctorate.

Hove entered the MBA program soon after it was launched in 1960, and the OSU business college began teaching a multidisciplinary concept for business management and leadership to a small army of future CEOs, entrepreneurs and visionaries who would now include women.

Hove remembers growing up wanting to be a businesswoman — while still a youngster, she decided she wanted to become president of

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS COURTESY BETTY MURRELL HOVE

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 19

Larry and Betty Hove (center) with their family.

General Motors. Though she was the only female student in her MBA class of 32, Hove said the graduate program, and the business college in general, fostered an inclusive, supportive learning environment for all students and she bonded easily and worked closely with her male classmates.

“The teachers made me feel important, and that was neat,” Hove said. “And I wasn’t the only one who felt like that. We all felt accepted and supported.”

Hove taught in an undergraduate statistics lab as a graduate teaching assistant and she considers the experience one of her college highlights. It gave her valuable work experience, spending money and a new appreciation for the work of teachers.

It was such a positive experience that in 2019 the Hoves endowed the Betty Murrell Hove Graduate Assistantship Fellowship for female MBA students at the Spears School of Business through the OSU Foundation.

Though Hove doesn’t recall facing any educational barriers as a woman, the reality of a woman competing in a business world dominated by men became apparent when she went to find a job. While still at OSU, Hove tried to land interviews with company recruiters visiting campus, but their announcements openly stated that only men need apply. Out of all the posted

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notices at the time, only one job was open to female candidates at a federal laboratory in New Mexico.

“In the ’50s and ’60s, the so-called corporate glass ceiling for women wasn’t so much glass as concrete,” Hove wrote for MBA Preferred: Celebrating 50 Years, the 2011 book profiling 50 distinguished OSU MBA graduates. The section Hove wrote about herself is aptly titled, “Don’t Tell Me I Can’t.”

Her husband was offered a job with defense contractor General Dynamics in Fort Worth, Texas, and the couple moved there. Hove’s first job was as an accountant at a small Fort Worth manufacturing company, followed by positions with Bell Helicopter, Fort Worth Public Works, and American Commercial Colleges. She also worked as the chief financial officer for the manufacturing company Larry bought and she started her own business providing small companies with accounting services.

Throughout her career, Hove bumped into that concrete ceiling, including facing blatant discrimination at one company early in her career. Not long after starting, a man with fewer qualifications and less education than Hove was hired for a better-paying job in her department.

She filed a complaint with the federal Equal

Employment Opportunity Commission and won the case.

The Hoves, who have been married for 59 years, still live in Fort Worth. Betty is retired, and Larry still works as an engineering contractor and consultant. In addition to managing her accounting business and working with her husband, Hove spent years serving as an officer and on boards of Fort Worth organizations, including the Women’s Center of Tarrant County, the Texas Ballet Theatre Guild and Planned Parenthood.

Betty and Larry are proud of their Oklahoma State legacy and especially because their two kids attended OSU. Jennifer Hove graduated in 1993 from Spears Business with a bachelor’s degree in accounting and management information systems.

Eric Hove graduated in 1995 with a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering. Both families, including Betty’s five grandchildren, live in Fort Worth.

Earning an MBA was a decision that rewarded Hove with experiences, opportunities and the confidence to always move up despite ceilings made of concrete. She said she always had a vision for her future, and her OSU education set her on that path.

“Even when I was just growing up, I could always see into the distance, and if you can see into the distance, you can go there,” Hove said. “That’s the lesson I’ve learned.”

Above: Though the Hoves and their children, including five grandkids, all live in Fort Worth, Texas, Conor Kilkenny (from left) and his cousins Cole and Jack Hove are diehard Cowboy fans like their grandparents.

Below: Betty and Larry graduated from graduate school together in 1964.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 21

Patricia Tilford

Equal Education’s Legacy A CHILD OF SEGREGATION EMBRACED OPPORTUNIT Y AT OSU Leaving home for the first time to attend college is exciting, emotional and sometimes scary. For Patricia Tilford, leaving her hometown of Tulsa to start her freshman year at Oklahoma State University 65 miles away was beyond emotional, considering the social upheaval the United States faced in the 1950s. A 1956 graduate and valedictorian of segregated Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa, Tilford began her studies at the OSU business college on a campus integrated only a few years earlier.

“It was a little scary for me because I had never been in a [racially] mixed situation like that before,” Tilford said. “Everybody at Tulsa’s Booker T. Washington was African American. So [at OSU], I’m in a new world altogether.”

Tilford found herself witnessing unprecedented change in the nation as the drive to desegregate public schools accelerated following the landmark 1954 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v.

Board of Education. The court’s ruling ended “separate but equal” educational facilities for blacks and whites.

Desegregation was still met with often violent opposition around the country. Black and white college students navigated new social norms as universities like OSU worked to make sure African Americans received a truly equal education.

In 1949, Nancy Randolph Davis became the first African American student to enroll at OSU, then

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Patricia Tilford, who earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at OSU, taught at Sapulpa (Oklahoma) High School for more than two decades.

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS COURTESY PATRICIA TILFORD

called Oklahoma A&M College. By the time Tilford arrived on campus in 1956, black students were at home throughout OSU classrooms and residence halls, but a fear of not being accepted remained.

Tilford recalls most white OSU students welcomed their African American classmates.

“The campus and the students, for the most part, were very friendly,” Tilford said. “I don’t remember ever being put down. In fact, I don’t think the people in the business college would have allowed that to happen.”

Tilford, a secretarial administration student, said the support of the school’s administrators, faculty and staff, including Dean Eugene Swearingen and advisor Dr. James Silverthorn, made it possible for her to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in 1960.

Silverthorn helped Tilford land her first job as a secretary and stenographer at Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma County. He even visited her on the base to “make sure they were treating me right,” she recalled.

Tilford also met her future husband, Kermit Tilford, an industrial arts education major and military veteran from McAlester, Oklahoma, at OSU. The two married on Sept. 30, 1961, and the next day the U.S. Army recalled Kermit to active duty as the Cuban Missile Crisis intensified.

Wanting to teach business, Patricia Tilford returned to OSU in 1976 to earn her teaching certificate and a master’s degree in business education, graduating in 1978. She taught for two decades at Sapulpa (Oklahoma) High School before retiring. Her husband was an administrator at the school.

Higher education, especially at OSU, has been a hallmark of the entire Tilford family. Kermit, who had graduated with a bachelor’s degree from OSU, went on to earn a doctorate in education from OSU after being hired as the assistant superintendent for the Sapulpa school system to help administer its desegregation program. But success at OSU didn’t end there. The couple’s three children, Kermit Tilford Jr., Bernadette Tilford and Milessa TilfordRutherford, all graduated with engineering degrees from Oklahoma State.

Now in retirement, the Tilfords live in the Houston area close to their children and grandchildren. As a first-generation college student, Patricia Tilford said her mother’s experiences growing up in Tulsa and surviving the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre had much to do with her pushing her daughter to go to college. Tilford said her mother, who worked most of her life cleaning the homes of white Tulsans, wanted more for her daughter.

“At Booker T. Washington High School, we girls were required to take home economics because most of us were going to end up being maids,” Tilford said. “But by the grace of God and my mother wanting me to go to college, other doors were opened to me, and those doors were opened for my kids, too. I am really humbled by that.”

For the 100th anniversary of business education at OSU in 2014, Tilford was one of the school’s “Spears School Tributes: 100 for 100” alumni honorees.

Tilford met her future husband, Kermit Tilford, at Oklahoma State and before they married in 1961, the couple attended a 1960 formal at OSU, below.

Kermit earned a bachelor’s degree and a doctorate in education from OSU while all three of the Tilfords’ children earned engineering degrees from Oklahoma State.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 23

Mary Logan

Opening Doors

A WOMAN IN A MAN’S CAREER SET HER OWN COURSE TO SUCCESS IN BUSINESS For Mary Logan, the world beyond Lawton, Oklahoma, seemed like such a big place though she hadn’t seen much of it when she arrived on the Oklahoma State University campus in 1969. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to do with her life, but she knew a world of opportunity awaited and that OSU could open the door for her.

Logan grew up in Lawton, a conservative community and gateway to Fort Sill, where career expectations for young women were modest.

“My adoptive mother always told me that I needed to learn shorthand and how to type so that I could find a job until I got married,” said Logan.

“It was understood that girls got married and had children.”

Logan was adopted at birth in 1949 by state Sen. Bill Logan and his wife, Jymmie Nell Logan.

The senator, a Lawton attorney, was elected at age 25 to the Oklahoma House of Representatives in 1938 and to the Senate two years later. Though he died in 1956 when Mary was just 7, being part of a dynamic political family affected her. She followed her adopted father’s lead and attended Cameron College in Lawton for two years before transferring to OSU. She decided to major in finance, a new degree at OSU, becoming only the second woman in the program. The first had graduated a year before her, but the two never met.

“I was interested in international finance because I wanted to be part of a global community,”

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Mary Logan’s bench at OSU quotes Ralph Waldo Emerson’s urging to be “Enthusiastic, engaged & enterprising.”

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS COURTESY MARY LOGAN

Logan said. “It was so outside of my geographically limited upbringing. I think I’d been to Dallas and Wichita Falls, Texas, and Joplin, Missouri, and that was pretty much it.”

Entering as a junior, she mastered most of her classes, though calculus and COBOL computer language programming were a challenge, and she retook both courses. Economics was one of Logan’s favorite subjects and in her senior year, she learned that with economics course credits from Cameron College along with what she earned at OSU she could declare a double major. Logan was told she was the first woman at OSU to major in both finance and economics.

After graduating in 1971, Logan moved to Tulsa to begin her first job as a finance officer for the Tulsa County assessor, but she soon ran headfirst into some obsolete ideas about a woman’s place in the office. Still new on the job, the assessor came to Logan and asked why she hadn’t cleaned the office kitchen the night before. Replying that she didn’t know she was supposed to, her boss showed her a cleaning schedule listing every woman in the office.

“There are no men on this list, I said, and he replied, ‘Men don’t clean kitchens,’” Logan said.

She resigned the next day with $435 in her checking account. She found a position as a budget analyst for the city of Tulsa and later worked as an accountant and budget coordinator for St. John Medical Center in Tulsa. In the meantime, she married and started a family.

Logan said her banking and finance career didn’t truly start until 1979 when she was hired by Bank Oklahoma in Tulsa as an internal auditor, followed quickly by a promotion to audit manager.

She joined the bank’s trust and estate department, working to protect the hard-earned wealth of her clients. She also attended and graduated with honors from the Bank Administration Institute’s School at the University of Wisconsin Madison.

Following a divorce, Logan moved to North Carolina in 1986 with her two young children, joining the trust and estate planning and administration division of First Union National Bank, which later became Wachovia Bank. Her role was expanded when she joined the Philanthropic Services Group as a nonprofit consultant. She later moved to the bank’s New Jersey office as trust and nonprofit manager before rejoining Wachovia’s home office in Charlotte, North Carolina, retiring in 2007 after directing its private foundation development program.

A career highpoint was receiving the Wachovia Point of Light Award in 2004, presented to only 10 employees each year out of 5,000 wealth managers.

Now retired in Scottsdale, Arizona, Logan enjoys spending time with her son, Jeff Pouland, and grandchildren in North Carolina and her daughter, Kim Pouland, an architect in Hawaii. She

continues to pursue her passion and support for higher education, including OSU. In 2018, Logan made a donation to place a campus beautification bench honoring the Spears School of Business near the OSU Library within sight of the Business Building.

Recently, Logan learned about a bittersweet connection to OSU when she discovered her biological father was an OSU graduate. Joy Don Johnson graduated on July 28, 1951, almost exactly 20 years before Logan graduated July 31, 1971.

Logan also learned that her father was killed in a private plane crash two days after his OSU commencement. Johnson had gone for a flight to celebrate learning his application to attend the U.S. Air Force Academy had been accepted. This year, Logan is placing a second bench on the OSU campus in memory of her father.

Logan’s continued love of OSU has grown in retirement as she reconnects with the university and Spears Business, where she is a member of the Dean’s Council and an OSU Alumni Association lifelong member. She is a testamentary donor to the university and annually donates to her own fund for the Spears School of Business Finance Department with an unrestricted gift.

“Professionally, Oklahoma State gave me my career, and personally it has meant camaraderie with friends, fellow alums and those at Spears,” she said.

Mary Logan with her children Kim and Jeff Poulard early in her career. Below: Logan appeared in the 1970 OSU yearbook with classmates from Drummond Hall.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 25

Serious About His Success

Alumnus credits his graduate years at OSU for decades of achievements in management information systems

G

rowing up in the 1970s outside Boston, Brian LeClaire was raised by educationfocused parents who instilled a strong work ethic in their three sons. Dad Leo LeClaire was an electrical engineering major who went to college on the GI Bill after enlisting in the Marines after high school. Mother Barbara was a nurse. From an early age, LeClaire said, the importance of education was emphasized in the household.

“I also liked to have fun, so I played football and baseball in high school and probably had a little bit

Brian LeClaire had a long career in the business world with his doctorate from Spears Business.

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too much fun,” he said. “I struggled to do well in school, preferring to do better on the field than in the classroom.”

The way LeClaire explains it, the “A” he received in a typing class his senior year allowed him to graduate from high school.

One wonders how his life would have gone if he hadn’t learned how to quickly type, “The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog” flawlessly on an IBM Selectric typewriter back in 1978.

A sampling of his accomplishments tells of his success since: • Earned three degrees, including a bachelor’s in psychology, an MBA with an emphasis in accounting and a doctorate in management information systems.

• Taught information technology concepts and techniques at graduate levels for several years.

• Served in various senior leadership roles across a 21-year career at Humana, a health and well-being company, including as senior vice president and chief information/ services officer, overseeing a $2 billion budget and more than 15,000 employees.

• Innovated and served as a founding board member of Availity, which today operates the largest real-time information network in health care, connecting over a million providers, health plans and their technology partners.

These feats are pretty impressive for someone whose education was hanging in the balance before that typing class. He first graduated from Ripon College, a small liberal arts school in Wisconsin.

LeClaire became certified to teach students who had learning disabilities in kindergarten through eighth grade. He also prepared to become a school or clinical psychologist. Instead, he decided to pursue his MBA, feeling an overriding desire to use his education to ensure he had multiple options in his career, with an ultimate goal of obtaining a doctorate.

STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTOS COURTESY BRIAN LECLAIRE

)

The “A� he received in a typing class his senior year allowed him to graduate from high school.

)

Brian LeClaire and his wife, Beth, an Oklahoma native whom he met while earning his doctorate from OSU, enjoy spending time flying.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 27

)

“There is no better place to invest in than a place and the people who invested in you.”

) Dr. Ramesh Sharda (left) and Brian LeClaire

“One of the big themes for me is around optionality,” he said. “I believe you should have a focus in life. What’s your objective? What drives you? You need passion, but you should have optionality, too. Ideally, passion drives career.

Education and experience create optionality. But it all starts with curiosity and a goal.”

After graduating from Ripon in 1982, he used his college graduation gift money to purchase a Timex Sinclair 1000 computer with 4k of memory and began to teach himself about its internal workings and how to program it. He enrolled at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh that fall.

“I had a passion for technology, a natural curiosity, and I did a lot of self-learning, which I still do to this day. I also helped my professors back then by developing VisiCalc spreadsheets for their accounting clients on early IBM PCs,” said LeClaire, who earned his MBA with an accounting emphasis in 1984.

But LeClaire’s desire to pursue a doctorate still pulled him. His search for doctoral programs in management information systems found only three in the United States — at the University of Indiana, University of Minnesota and Oklahoma State University. He applied to Indiana and OSU and was accepted to both.

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“It was a conversation with Wayne Meinhart (head of OSU’s Department of Management — Management Science and Information Systems) that caused me to say that’s the place I want to go,” he said. “He was extremely receptive. He was very inviting, very accommodating. He spent time, in essence, recruiting me. He invested in me.”

Today, more than 35 years later, LeClaire calls his time at OSU a life-changing experience.

That’s where he met Dr. Ramesh Sharda, who was then a relatively junior associate professor but who is now vice dean for graduate programs and research at Spears Business, and the two developed not only mutual admiration but also a friendship.

“Like Brian, I have always had a penchant for learning about new technologies,” Sharda said. “Soon after getting tenure, I started teaching a doctoral seminar in advanced topics in management information systems. Brian took that class and did extremely well.

“When it was time for him to work on his dissertation, he asked me to be his advisor. He was interested in an emerging (then) topic, objectoriented programming. We learned a lot through this project, and it set a foundation for Brian’s continued zeal for new technologies that has led him to have such a stellar career. I am so proud of everything Brian has been able to achieve.”

LeClaire spent five years at OSU, earning his Ph.D. in management information systems with a quantitative emphasis and doctoral minor in computer science. He accepted a position as an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee upon graduating in 1989, where he taught graduate-level courses. He liked teaching but found he enjoyed applying technology in the business world. “I felt like I had found the sweet spot, and I could take what I’d learned and make a difference in people’s lives in a practical way. Who wouldn’t want that?”

Eventually, LeClaire left academia for the business world, where he worked for Prudential Insurance (1993-96) and Alltel Information Systems (1996-99) before being hired as vice president in Humana’s information technology organization. He was eventually promoted to chief information officer, chief information/services officer and finally to senior vice president and chief information officer in 2014. After two decades with Humana, LeClaire retired last December.

“My technology-based core learnings and experiences navigating higher-stakes organizational dynamics all came during my time at Oklahoma State,” LeClaire said. “They’ve served as a solid foundation for the career I’ve had.

My intellectual intelligence was challenged and grew, coming through the technology, quantitative analysis and computer science experiences I had

while there. But also, the organizational dynamics and coaching I received helped me learn to navigate large organizations and their dynamics.”

The LeClaires — Brian and his wife, Beth, a Ponca City, Oklahoma, native whom he met in what was then known as the College of Business Administration at OSU — recently found a way to give back to Oklahoma State. Through a gift to the OSU Foundation’s Brighter Orange, Brighter Future campaign, the couple established two technology-based scholarships for women at OSU. “Beth and I had discussed giving back to OSU many times. It was only a matter of when and how to do so,” he said. “Eventually we decided that setting up an endowed scholarship was the best thing to do. It was clear to me from my experiences in the field of technology, both in academia and industry, that it is diversity-challenged, perhaps, especially for women.

“Opportunities may be abundant, yet it seems it’s also about investing in individuals who may not have the wherewithal to build the right personal foundation to pursue them, but otherwise have the desire, passion, curiosity and innate ability to do so. Yes, my typing story is funny and true, but had others not invested in me, our lives may have been radically different. We believe the time is right to pay it forward. There is no better place to invest in than a place and the people who invested in you.”

The LeClaires picked out the orange and black colors when they purchased their Cirrus SR 22 airplane, which they enjoy flying across the country.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 29

Taking Education Personally Three give their take on what the Spears Business motto ‘The Power of Personal’ means

Caroline Riley (left) guides a tour in her role as a Spears Ambassador.

A

t the Spears School of Business, preparing students for success means emphasizing personal relationships and interpersonal competencies right alongside teaching high-quality technical business skills. Called “The Power of Personal,” the approach begins with a Spears community that takes this personal approach to heart.

The strength of the idea behind The Power of Personal is that those at Spears Business involved in the process — students, faculty and staff — truly believe that business is personal and that relationships matter. Meet three of those people who take the Spears motto personally.

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STUDENT CAROLINE RILEY

Caroline Riley graduated this spring with a bachelor’s degree in marketing and an energy finance minor and started a two-year management trainee program with BNSF Railway.

Riley transferred to OSU after her freshman year at the University of Alabama. Stillwater was closer to her family in Amarillo, Texas — she could visit often and yet be far enough away to be independent.

Spears Business felt like home, she said. A campus tour in the fall of 2017 with a Spears advisor and the one-on-one attention she received sealed the deal.

“That close, personal circumstance I think really attracted me to Spears,” Riley said.

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS

“To me, it means giving 100 percent every day and being available to be relational with other people.” ­­­­— CAROLINE RILEY

PROFESSOR DR. GOUTAM CHAKRABORT Y

Riley became a Spears Ambassador, representing the school with prospective students and their families. For her, The Power of Personal means serving her community both at OSU and beyond campus.

“To me, it means giving 100 percent every day and being available to be relational with other people,” Riley said. “And Spears gives its students so many great opportunities to do that and for me that means being able to serve as a Spears Ambassador.”

Her two years as an ambassador helped her grow as a person and a student, she said.

“To be an ambassador means having passion not only for business, but also the passion to sell what I had grown to love. The goal for the ambassadors is to serve potential students, and we do that by beginning to pour into their lives even before they step onto campus.”

Riley and her fellow ambassadors hosted résumé workshops at Stillwater High School and worked at Our Daily Bread food pantry in Stillwater to package donated food for those in need.

“Being a Spears student makes you think about how you will serve the broader community once you’re out in the real world,” she said.

Dr. Goutam Chakraborty is SAS Professor of Marketing Analytics and director of the master’s degree program in business analytics and data science. In 2019, he won the Spears’ Power of Personal award.

Chakraborty has been a professor at OSU since 1991. Before earning his doctorate and joining academia, he worked as a math tutor for school classmates in Calcutta, India, where he grew up, and the experience made him realize he wanted to be a teacher.

“It meant something to me to help people see things they don’t normally see,” he said. “I could explain high-level math to other students that they didn’t get.”

Chakraborty earned his doctorate in marketing at the University of Iowa, where he also taught an undergraduate marketing research course. His high expectations for students led to feedback such as “he’s trying to kill us!”

Chakraborty laughs about that 1987 class, but he is still a tough professor who demands much from his students.

“I’m hard. I have high expectations and I tell my students that on the first day,” Chakraborty said. “But I’ll also tell them that I will be their biggest supporter, and I’ll also love them to death, but you’ve got to do your work. I tell them the same thing I tell my own kids.”

Dr. Goutam Chakraborty

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“There is only one thing in my life that I can give them, and it’s the most important thing that I have, and that is my time.”

— DR. GOUTAM CHAKRABORTY

His well-known reputation for challenging students hasn’t hurt applications to his master’s program, which accepts only 40 students out of more than 200 who apply each year. Students are drawn to his classes and his program because of his personal style of teaching and relating to his students.

“Everything I do is personal, meaning it’s a relationship,” he said. “I tell my students that there is only one thing in my life that I can give them, and it’s the most important thing that I have, and that is my time.”

That continued giving of his time has meant that many students credit him with changing the direction of their lives.

“The most rewarding thing is when students who graduated come back and tell me, ‘You changed my life.’ This has happened many times,” Chakraborty said.

ACADEMIC ADVISOR COLEMAN HICKMAN

For Coleman Hickman, The Power of Personal speaks volumes about what he does each day as an academic advisor, serving nearly 300 undergraduates in the Chesapeake Energy Business Student Success Center.

He considers connecting personally with each of his students an important part of his job — just as important as knowing degree requirements.

One student recently asked Hickman how many students he advises; the large number was a surprise.

“He told me he was surprised I had so many because I seemed to remember so much about him,” Hickman said. “That tells me they’re paying attention to what we do and the effort we put in trying to get to know them.”

Hickman learned the value of bonding with young people after spending nearly a decade teaching agriculture at Jenks (Oklahoma) High School. At OSU, where he is also a doctoral student, Hickman said he can relate to students by sharing his own experiences.

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“The most rewarding part of my job is being a part of their success and seeing their eyes light up when they realize, ‘I can do this.’”

— COLEMAN HICKMAN

“I’m able to incorporate my own struggles as a student into our meetings, and that allows them to understand, ‘Oh, he really does know what I’m going through and what it means to cram for a test or finish a paper under pressure,’” Hickman said.

Hickman said an important part of an advisor’s job is listening as students talk through their issues. Scheduling classes is the easy part, he said, but being someone that they can talk to is important.

“I enjoy student meetings more when the time spent talking about classes is just a small part of it,” Hickman said. “When we’re talking about the trips they’re going on and the different opportunities that they have, the internships, that’s when it’s more meaningful.”

As an advisor for analytical majors, Hickman works with freshmen through seniors in accounting, finance, economics and management information systems. An often-emotional part of the job is working with students who are struggling and need to talk as they think about changing the direction of the career that they had set their sights on years before.

His listening and encouragement helps his students make the decisions that best lead to realizing their goals, Hickman said.

“The most rewarding part of my job is being a part of their success and seeing their eyes light up when they realize, ‘I can do this.’”

Spears Business academic advisor Coleman Hickman works with students in new student orientation.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 33

FOUR DECADE JOURNEY LEADS SPEARS STUDENT FROM PAIN AND HEALING TO HOPE AND DETERMINATION

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isiting Munich, Germany, in the fall means a trip to the world-famous Oktoberfest, the huge celebration where a nation comes together to share its love of beer. For Cindy Crenshaw-Martin, vacationing in Munich with friends in 1980, the fun she expected walking through the festival’s main entrance vaporized before it began.

Instead, fire and carnage would change the course of her life.

Crenshaw-Martin graduated from Oklahoma State University this spring with a bachelor’s degree that she has worked for, off and on, for nearly 40 years. She’s among college students often described as nontraditional because they may be working on their degree online and/or part time or because they are considered older than the average student. The 61-year-old is nontraditional in many ways besides her age — most notably because of her long, often difficult journey to get where she is today at the Spears School of Business.

“Two of my three kids are college graduates, and they’re all successful,” Crenshaw-Martin said. “It was my oldest son who encouraged me to go back to OSU, and now I’m really thankful to be here.”

Raised in California, Crenshaw-Martin wanted to go to college, but her family couldn’t afford to send her. One option was military service, which Crenshaw-Martin saw as a chance to qualify for the GI Bill and as a way to

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STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS COURTESY CINDY CRENSHAW-MARTIN

Above: Cindy Crenshaw-Martin wanted to go to college but instead joined the Air Force first to qualify for the GI Bill. Left: Crenshaw-Martin with fellow airmen in her technical school. Far left: Standing at the Oktoberfest gate in Munich, West Germany, with her husband near the spot where she was seriously wounded in a terrorist bombing.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 35

see some of the world. In 1977, she joined the Air Force and attended tech school to learn to maintain microwave communications systems. She was 19 and eager for adventure.

The Air Force allowed her to pick her station, and she chose Hahn Air Base in West Germany, arriving there in December 1978. As the 1970s ended and the ’80s opened, politically charged environments raged throughout the world. U.S. embassy personnel in Iran were taken hostage in 1979, while in Europe protestors often marched in opposition to the presence of American nuclear weapons. Crenshaw-Martin remembers occasional bomb threats at American military bases, but she said she never felt threatened.

In September 1980, Crenshaw-Martin and fellow airmen from Hahn, including her husband at the time, traveled to Munich for a five-day leave. It would be her last chance to see some of West Germany before she shipped back to the United States in December. The group visited historic sites and on their third night headed to the Oktoberfest. As they walked into the festival entrance underneath the greeting “Willkommen Zum Oktoberfest,” a tremendous explosion ripped through the crowd.

“When we were walking in, that’s when the man set off the bomb in a trashcan,” CrenshawMartin said. “There were over 200 hurt, 13 killed, including the terrorist. I was so close to the blast that the fire burned my hair, my eyelashes.”

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But burns were not her worst injuries. Bomb fragments severed Crenshaw-Martin’s left leg below the knee and shattered her right leg. She suffered cuts to her face and head while shrapnel nicked her spinal cord. The Americans with her, including her husband, received less serious wounds with one, amazingly, unhurt.

“I wasn’t supposed to make it, but God had other plans,” Crenshaw-Martin said. “The Air Force called my family and said, ‘You need to come,’ because they just assumed I wouldn’t make it.”

She was told a taxi driver saved her life that night by applying tourniquets to her legs and carrying her to an ambulance. From a Munich doctor’s “miraculous” work in the hours after the bombing to the next nine months of numerous operations and recovery, Crenshaw-Martin’s life was in the hands of surgeons, nurses, physical therapists, counselors and experts in prosthetics.

The terrorist was identified as a German rightwing extremist. Investigators concluded he was not a suicide bomber, but his device detonated prematurely. Authorities also believed he acted alone until the investigation was reopened 34 years later, in 2014, when new evidence suggested he may have had accomplices, but no collaborators were identified. Though American military personnel were injured, they were not the targets.

Investigators believe he was trying to spread chaos before upcoming national elections.

After being initially treated in military hospitals in West Germany and the U.S., CrenshawMartin was transferred to Oak Knoll Naval

Following the bombing, CrenshawMartin endured nine months of surgeries, recovery and rehabilitation including learning to walk again with prosthetic legs.

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Hospital in Oakland, Calif., where healing and rehabilitation continued and where she began to learn how to walk again with prosthetic legs.

“The first man who built my legs was a Vietnam veteran who’d lost one of his legs stepping on a landmine, and he was just the most insane, fun person,” she said. “I came in contact with a lot of really positive people at Oak Knoll who worked hard to get me back up on my feet and get me back to living.”

Nine months after the bombing, CrenshawMartin walked out of Oak Knoll with the help of crutches.

“I literally walked out, but I needed the crutches because I have paralysis on the right side from the spinal cord being nicked by shrapnel, but I didn’t care,” she said. “I was just happy to be alive and to have come through all the surgeries and then the work on my legs.”

After her release from the hospital, CrenshawMartin received a medical discharge from the Air Force, and the next phase of her life loomed. Her first mission was to travel, and she set out on two cross-country road trips, one with a friend and one a 10,000-mile solo trip. It was during her solo trip while visiting an aunt and uncle in Ponca City, Okla., that her uncle suggested she consider going to school at OSU. After a campus visit, she enrolled and in the fall of 1983, the 25-year-old freshman and veteran began classes in the College of Business Administration. A year later, she married for a second time and the couple started a family, which meant struggling to balance family and school while helping with her husband’s business.

She eventually left OSU to focus on raising her three children.

“I loved being an at-home mom, and I was very active in the kids’ schools,” she said.

In 2007, she re-enrolled at OSU for two semesters but quit again because of the cost, believing she no longer qualified for veterans’ educational benefits. Her oldest son, Jason Crenshaw, an OSU graduate and a veteran who served in Iraq, encouraged his mom to finish her degree and to use her experiences to help a new generation of wounded veterans.

“I want to be able to encourage veterans to look at how many blessings they have and how important their lives are,” Crenshaw-Martin said.

“My son, who is a veteran also, planted the seed and gave me the reason to go back. He said, ‘Mom, can

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“MOM, CAN YOU THINK ABOUT GOING BACK TO SCHOOL SO THAT YOU CAN HELP VETERANS, BECAUSE TOO MANY ARE KILLING THEMSELVES?”

— JASON CRENSHAW

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 39

“I WANT TO ENCOURAGE OTHERS TO BELIEVE THAT NO PROBLEM IS INSURMOUNTABLE. WHEN I WOULD START THINKING THAT I HAD IT BAD, I WOULD ALWAYS MEET SOMEBODY WHO HAD IT WORSE BUT WAS MENTALLY STRONG AND DOING SOMETHING FOR OTHERS. I DON’T WANT EVIL TO WIN, SO IF I CAN HELP OTHER PEOPLE SEE THAT BLESSINGS ARE ALWAYS AROUND THE CORNER, THEN GOOD TRIUMPHS OVER EVIL.” — CINDY CRENSHAW-MARTIN

you think about going back to school so that you can help veterans, because too many are killing themselves?’”

When Crenshaw-Martin contacted the Department of Veterans Affairs to find out if she was eligible for education benefits, she was told no.

She was referred to a VA vocational rehabilitation counselor who notified her that because of her injuries, she actually did qualify for assistance. The doors to the OSU Spears School of Business opened to her, and she returned in the fall of 2018, needing 39 hours to complete the degree she started in 1983.

She was a university student again while her children were grown up and starting their own families, but that didn’t mean going back to school, at age 60, was going to be easy. She had a fear that students younger than her own kids wouldn’t accept her, but Spears students made her feel welcome. “They’re just phenomenal,” she said.

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She also continued taking classes through the illness of her third husband, Terry Martin.

Martin had been stationed at Hahn Air Base at the same time she was, though they didn’t know each other. Cindy, divorced from her second husband, met Martin through an online Air Force veterans’ group. The two married and spent time touring the country, including trips on Martin’s HarleyDavidson, and traveling to Europe where they visited Munich and the site of the Oktoberfest bombing. Martin’s health deteriorated after a liver transplant and open-heart surgery, and he died last year.

Crenshaw-Martin said she often did homework in her husband’s hospital room because she was determined to finish her degree.

“I was just not going to quit, because I’ve quit before,” she said.

Crenshaw-Martin wants to volunteer to help injured veterans recover from traumatic injuries,

PHOTO JEFF JOINER

just as others helped her. After graduating this spring, and once the COVID-19 pandemic that marred her senior year and that of more than 1,000 other Spears Business seniors is no longer a threat, she plans to volunteer at the Oklahoma City VA Health Care System, where she has spent so much time over the years receiving care.

“I want to encourage others to believe that no problem is insurmountable,” she said. “When I would start thinking that I had it bad, I would always meet somebody who had it worse but was mentally strong and doing something for others. I don’t want evil to win, so if I can help other people see that blessings are always around the corner, then good triumphs over evil.

“It’s kind of like when you drop the stone in the pond and the ripples go out and intersect with others. I think goodness grows like that.”

With the world beginning to return to normal in the wake of the coronavirus crisis,

Crenshaw-Martin brings an uplifting perspective on all that happened this year. She had a difficult last semester in school, not only because of the coronavirus and because her final courses were so difficult, but she also struggled to keep a positive attitude while looking after her father, who suffers from dementia. And after his nursing home was locked down, the pressure of not being able to see him and not being able to see friends was almost too much.

But Crenshaw-Martin wouldn’t let the virus, classes or her postponed commencement ceremony break her. After all, she had come through something so much worse.

“From that moment (of the bombing) on, every day has been a blessing to me, because, against all odds, I shouldn’t have made it,” she said. “I have an appreciation for life and even when there are hardships, because once we get through the hardships, the good things mean more.”

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#SPEARSBUSINESS We live in a world that is more connected than ever before. That’s why Spears Business is dedicated to keeping our students, parents, faculty, staff, alumni and donors up to date through engaging and informational social media content. Below is #SpearsBusiness social media by the numbers for 2019.

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ALUMNI A S S O C I AT I O N

RESEARCH

Not All Fun and Games OSU researcher examines a dark side to professional online esports

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nline multiplayer video games such as League of Legends, Overwatch and others are exploding in popularity thanks to the growing sophistication of these games, the increasing power of personal computers and the improved access to faster broadband. Today, there are even professional gamers hired by teams to compete in league competitions often watched by millions of spectators.

But who do those professional esports gamers work for, if anyone, and who is protecting their financial interests, health and safety?

Oklahoma State University researcher Dr. John Holden has studied this lesser-known side of

Dr. John Holden

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esports, an industry that many compare with such professional sports leagues as the NBA and NFL. In fact, esports have grown to rival traditional sports in terms of viewership, sponsorships and media deals in the last few years.

“Esports … have become more popular around the world than almost any of these sports, with numbers of online viewers and participants surpassing some of the most-attended and mostwatched professional sporting events, other than the Super Bowl,” Holden wote in the American Business Law Journal in 2019.

In 2017, 46 million unique viewers watched one esports tournament, which was a larger audience than Game 7 of the 2016 World Series drew (23.4 million viewers), according to Holden, an assistant professor in the Department of Management in the Spears School of Business.

Professional sports organizations like the NBA, NFL, NHL and Major League Baseball work routinely and cooperatively (for the most part) with players associations and team owners to set salary caps and working conditions. Esports players face an entirely different model where the games they play are the intellectual property of the companies that develop them, including the makers of the three most popular esports titles: League of Legends, Counter Strike: Global Offensive, and Overwatch. That gives the companies tremendous control over the competitors who play their games and the teams that hire them.

Much as ride-hailing companies like Uber and Lyft regularly fight regulators in court to classify drivers as independent contractors, esports leagues and game makers argue their players are not employees protected by federal and state laws.

“The most basic protections for employees include wage and hour considerations, so if

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS AND PHIL SHOCKLEY

The Tribal Esports Conference and Gaming Fest at OSU in March 2019 drew a number of players.

they’re considered an employee, they’re subject to minimum wage requirements,” Holden said. “If you’re an independent contractor, you’re often thought of as having fewer rights, and it’s cheaper for an organization to employ independent contractors.”

But how serious is the problem, really, and aren’t we just talking about playing video games?

The issues are serious enough that the expression “death by gaming” was coined by industry watchers.

Holden cites research identifying incidents where competitors were known to play until they were overcome by exhaustion and even died.

“There have been allegations of gamers practicing 12, 14 hours a day,” Holden said. “They don’t even get up to eat and just live in their chair and practice nonstop because the leagues are so competitive and players who can’t stay at a very high level are replaceable.”

Just as is the case with professional athletes, a few top players in esports are well paid, but a huge number of other gamers barely make a living wage.

Holden cites research where gamers report making as little as $400 a month after paying coaches, team fees and other associated costs to play.

Now that esports is gaining mainstream attention with companies like Mercedes-Benz, Intel and Coca-Cola signing on as sponors, Holden said he believes the industry is at the precipice of a player movement not unlike when professional athletes began to organize and demand a stronger place at the bargaining table.

“Collective bargaining has produced meaningful advances in workplace conditions and compensation for professional athletes,” Holden wrote. “Esports competitors might be able to overcome the extreme imbalance in power … with leagues by combining their leverage.”

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 45

RESEARCH

Forecasting Future Pain

OSU economics research paints a bleak picture of the pandemic’s impact

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he economic shutdown in the state and across the nation due to the coronavirus pandemic is causing Oklahomans pain.

Much of that pain is being felt by those whose jobs are tied to the state’s energy sector, which experienced a collapse in oil prices that for one day in April saw the price of a barrel of oil plummet to below zero.

Economists like Oklahoma State University’s Dr. Dan Rickman study the economic repercussions of major events such as the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, or of deep downturns in the economy like the Great Recession of 2008 in order to provide government policymakers, elected

officials and private business leaders information needed to make decisions.

Officials needs to know how badly and how long these events will impact the nation, and they often turn to economists for answers. In the case of the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on Oklahoma, some of that information came from economic researchers at the Spears School of Business where Rickman, a Regents Professor in economics, and Dr. Hongbo Wang, director of the school’s Center for Applied Economic Research, wrote a forecast for the state’s economy based on models showing just how vulnerable the state is to the pandemic on two economic fronts.

“It’s not a pretty picture,” said Rickman.

“Oklahoma faces economic fallout from both COVID-19 and collapsing oil prices.”

The OSU economists predicted a 21 percent drop in the state’s gross domestic product in the second quarter of 2020 that began April 1. If there is a bright spot, the state’s GDP was expected to be stronger than the expected national GDP decline of 26.5 percent. Those losses far exceed the decline in GDP in any period during the record-setting recession of 2008 and 2009, according to Rickman.

For Oklahoma, the study predicts a best-case scenario of a loss of 10,000 jobs in Oklahoma’s energy sector due to falling oil prices. The report’s worst-case scenario forecast the possibility of another 10,000 jobs lost depending on how low the price of oil falls, and the report was written before the price went negative in April. The state’s postpandemic unemployment picture won’t be clear until at least the end of this year.

Rickman’s research forecasts a slow recovery for the state that lags behind the revival of the U.S. economy expected after businesses began to reopen in many parts of the country in May.

Dr. Dan Rickman

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STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS GARY LAWSON

Rickman and Wang predict Oklahoma’s economic situation will worsen before it slowly begins to improve by the end of 2020. Contraction in the energy sector is likely to continue through the remainder of the year unless oil prices make a dramatic recovery, Rickman said.

Economists are closely watching how well the nation’s restart progresses this summer as states, regions and cities reopen for business as local conditions warrant, according to Rickman.

“The success of the national recovery depends on the country’s management of the pandemic,” he said.

Economists are concerned about restarting the economy without more testing and better tracking of the coronavirus to avoid flare-ups and the need to lock down parts of the country again.

Rickman also forecasts total employment growth and wage and salary growth in Oklahoma will lag behind the nation through next year. And those forecasts already take into consideration the federal government’s $2.2 trillion pandemic stimulus package passed this spring and unemployment compensation paid to millions of Americans who lost jobs because of the economic chaos. According to Rickman, one of the most serious impacts on states will be the loss of revenue to state and local governments.

“Only a small percentage of the state’s economy is tied to energy sector wages and salary employment,” Rickman said. “The problem we face is that the sector provides a lot of revenue

for governments and schools. We’re really going to be suffering in terms of loss of revenue for governments hit by the pandemic that are having to spend a lot of money. State and local governments are going to be in great difficulty unless we get another federal stimulus package directed at them.”

Dr. Hongbo Wang

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The Challenges of Going First OSU and Spears Business help first-generation college students overcome hurdles

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aleb Wofford has to laugh when he thinks about the long, sometimes torturous path he’s followed to Oklahoma State University.

The 27-year-old has attended four different colleges, and his passion for a career didn’t gel until he landed at the Spears School of Business in 2017.

He says the trip was worth it — it just took a while.

“For many people, going to college and getting a degree is almost automatic,” Wofford said. “But for me, it was definitely a harder road.”

Caleb Wofford

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Wofford is among many OSU students who are the first members of their immediate families to attend college. Each first-generation student brings a unique story of coming to be a Cowboy, stories that usually differ considerably from those of students who followed parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to Stillwater. For “legacies” who bleed orange, the road to OSU may have been set before they were born, but many first-gens don’t bleed orange until they arrive on campus and try it on for size.

Research has shown that first-generation students take longer to graduate and quit more often than traditional students. According to the First Generation Foundation, a staggering 89 percent of low-income first-generation students leave college without a degree within six years, and more than a quarter leave after their first year.

There are many social, economic, cultural and historic reasons why these students may struggle, but common to their stories are the unique challenges first-gens face as trailblazers.

Wofford is a member of the Cherokee Nation from Pryor, Oklahoma. Since graduating from high school, he has attended Bacone College in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Rogers State University at its Pryor campus twice, Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas, and now OSU. Wofford said his inability to settle in at a college had more to do with his outlook than any issues with schools.

“I struggled with the mindset that I wasn’t smart enough, not good enough to go to college,” he said.

“I was complacent about my future and was using college as a way to avoid becoming an adult.”

It wasn’t until Wofford came to OSU and found the right mix of academic support and a campus community he connected with through the OSU Center for Sovereign Nations, a campus resource for Native American students, that his attitude changed. Wofford graduated this spring with a bachelor’s degree in management, and he’s not done yet. He has applied to several law schools that offer programs specializing in Native American law and

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS

plans to become one of just 2,600 Native attorneys currently practicing in the United States.

First-generation students like Wofford and junior Tatum Cole of Tulsa share a common issue: Without parents or other relatives who attended college, there is little knowledgeable support at home to help with critical decisions such as picking a degree program or even the right college to meet their needs. And many of those decisions are made while still in high school.

“As a first generation, I’ve never had anyone I could bounce ideas off of,” Cole said.

Cole grew up in Wagoner, Oklahoma, and played soccer on scholarship at private Bishop Kelley High School in Tulsa. As a youngster, she dreamed of going to college. Beginning in fifth grade she started doing internet searches for “cool-looking” schools and making lists of what she would need to apply, such as SAT and ACT test scores. But Cole didn’t realize the value of taking the PSAT test and missed the test date.

“My parents and I didn’t really know what the test was for. We didn’t know that was important at all,” Cole said. “I just knew that I should probably

Top left: A member of the Native American Student Association, Wofford was an event coordinator for OSU’s annual fall Pow Wow, which includes native dancers including members of Wofford’s own Cherokee Nation.

Top: Members of Wofford's family from Pryor, Oklahoma.

Above: Wofford found community and academic support as a student ambassador for the OSU Center for Sovereign Nations, directed by Elizabeth Payne, (left).

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 49

Tatum Cole do some volunteer work, and that there would probably be interviews involved.”

Like Wofford, Cole was indecisive about some parts of her college education; in her case, it was choosing a major. She has studied nursing, psychology, accounting and is now majoring in management at Spears Business. Cole started at the University of Tulsa before transferring to OSU for her junior year.

“I’m sure being a first-generation student had something to do with it,” she said. “I’m kind of a chronic dabbler.”

It’s not unusual for first-gen students to need time to find their bearings at college in order to make informed choices about important things such as academic and career advising, and often they feel alone without family members who have been there. Fortunately for Cole and Wofford, Spears Business provided them with support through the Chesapeake Energy Business Student Success Center.

Both students have gone through difficult personal issues that made college even more

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trying. Cole had spent much of her youth playing for competitive soccer teams, including large regional club teams. For her and her family, soccer was to be a way to pay for college, but in Cole’s senior year in high school the pressure of playing at such a high level for years finally overwhelmed her, and she quit the sport.

“Sports shaped a huge part of who I am,” Cole said. “But things happen for a reason.”

At TU and later at OSU, Cole threw herself into her classes, joined research projects and traveled on college-sponsored trips. She studied at a university in Bangalore, India, with a TU program and made a trip to Mexico with Spears Business students through the Cagle Center for Advanced Global Leadership and Engagement. While visiting the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, Cole met a U.S. diplomat who has since been influential in guiding her toward a career in international relations or with the U.S. Foreign Service.

“I spent two months studying in India, which was my first time on a plane, and I now email regularly with a diplomat who’s helping me with my career,” Cole said. “Now, I think I can do anything.”

For Wofford, life threw curves at him in the years after high school, but once he settled into his business studies at OSU and began working at the Center for Sovereign Nations, a picture of his future came into sharp focus. This spring, Wofford found out he has been accepted to study law at Oklahoma City University Law School. As with most first-gen students, Wofford benefited from joining a campus community, in this case the Center for Sovereign Nations.

“Working at the center has been life-changing for me,” he said.

Though OSU postponed spring commencement because of COVID-19, Wofford had already bought his cap and gown earlier in the semester, and he took them home to Pryor to show his family.

“I wanted to show them I was graduating, and my mom started crying and my dad was really proud,” Wofford said. “They’ve seen where I’ve been and where I am now, and it’s just night and day.”

Tatum Cole, of Tulsa, faced the double hurdle of being a firstgeneration and a transfer student at Oklahoma State, both of which carry their own unique challenges. Never shy about experiencing opportunities, Tatum participated in a Spears Business study abroad trip to Mexico (above) where she became interested in international relations as a career.

FINDING HELP Both OSU and Spears Business offer financial and academic resources for first-generation students. Visit the OSU F1RST2GO program (okla.st/1st2go) to learn more about university resources and the Chesapeake Energy Business Student Success Center (okla.st/ bizsuccess) to learn how Spears Business can help.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 51

SENIORS

Top Spears senior is ‘proud to be a Cowboy’

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oleman Bourke, a quantitative economics major from Tulsa who graduated in May, is the recipient of the 2020 Raymond D. Thomas Award given annually to the top senior in the Spears School of Business.

He will lead the Class of 2020 into Gallagher-Iba Arena for commencement in December and will be the first business student to receive his diploma.

Bourke is currently a software implementation consultant for Bluvault Solutions in Dallas. He was one of only 16 2019-2020 Outstanding Seniors named by the OSU Alumni Association.

Bourke was a junior Greek life coordinator, Beta Theta Pi new member educator, a Spears Business ambassador, a Mortar Board member and a Business Scholar Leader. He co-founded Mesh, a social advocacy philanthropy for public school students with special needs, and volunteered at the Jenks Community Food Bank and the Tulsa Regional Special Olympics. Bourke was a Top Ten Freshman Man and received the President’s Volunteer Service Award and the Rights of Citizens with Developmental Disabilities Advocacy Award.

He was also a Spears Outstanding Senior and a Spears Top 5 Economics Senior.

PHOTO GARY LAWSON

WE ASKED HIM ABOUT THE THOMAS AWARD AND MORE. What does this award represent?

This award is such an honor. Spears has given me opportunities I could not have dreamed about for the last four years. I came into school not knowing what I wanted to do with my life or even what degree I wanted to get, but from my very first business classes with some of the greats like Dr. (Bill) McLean, Dr. (Lee) Manzer and Professor (Rachel) Cox, I found support and guidance in Spears. My teachers have been my greatest mentors and confidants as I have navigated this path, and my classmates have shared with me both in the griefs, like late nights studying, and the joys, such as successful job interviews. This award is the culmination of the challenges, successes, difficulties and triumphs of my college career. I sure am proud to be a Cowboy.

How have the Spears Business professors and faculty impacted you?

I have not had a single professor in Spears who didn’t care about their students and what they were teaching. All of my teachers made themselves incredibly approachable and easy to seek out. I formed great relationships with many of them.

What is your greatest piece of advice for future business students?

Treat your classes as more than an obligation. It is easy to get caught up in your schedule with all of the work you have to do and forget that the curriculum your teachers give is designed to help you gain skills that will make you competitive in the business world, and that your professors want you to treat them as people and not just the person at the front of the room.

The other thing I would implore young students to do is study abroad, and the longer, the better.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 53

SENIORS

Spears Business students among OSU’s Outstanding Seniors Joining Coleman Bourke as Spears Business students named among the 2020 Outstanding Seniors by the Oklahoma State University Alumni Association were:

BRENT CUNNINGHAM

Bartlesville, Oklahoma Cunningham, an accounting major, was vice president of traditions for the Student Alumni Board, a facilitator for the President’s Leadership Council, vice president of communications for Sigma Phi Epsilon, a Spears Business government senator and a member of Mortar Board National Honor Society. He worked with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, the Mary Martha Outreach Center, the Oklahoma State PB&J Project, the Helping Hands Fundraiser and Stamp Out Starvation. Cunningham was also a Top Ten Freshman Man and an IFC Outstanding Greek New Member, and he received the SGA President Student Leader Award, the National Balanced Man Scholarship and the Olin D. Branstetter Memorial Scholarship.

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WHITNEY MARTIN

Lawton, Oklahoma An economics major, Martin was the programming director for OSU’s Camp Cowboy, an OSU Residential Life community mentor, a Spears Business teaching assistant, a MODMuze Magazine photographer and an Economics Society member. She served as an OSU Camp Cowboy counselor and a LASSO Center supplemental instructor, and volunteered at the Stillwater Humane Society, MEE Competition and Our Daily Bread Food and Resource Center in Stillwater.

Martin was also a member of the OSU Homecoming Royalty Court, named a Top 5 Economics Senior by Spears Business, an OSU Camp Cowboy Outstanding Counselor and was named to the President’s Honor Roll in all four years at OSU.

SHAZIA QASIM

Grapevine, Texas Qasim majored in finance and served as the Kappa Delta Chi Sorority Inc. vice president and service officer, a Spears Business ambassador, a Spears Undergraduate Panel representative and panel chair for the Division of Academic Affairs. She was also a member of the Mortar Board Honor Society and a board member and Class of 2020 representative for the Spears Scholar Leaders. She founded the Kappa Delta Chi Sorority 5K Waddlethon, tutored ESL students at Stillwater High School and second grade students in Southlake, Texas, and volunteered at Weekend Food Snacks for Children and at Our Daily Bread Food and Resource Center in Stillwater. Qasim was also awarded the Spears Business Scholar Leadership Scholarship, the Williams Inc. Scholar Leader Scholarship, the Neal Savage Scholarship, the Kappa Delta Chi Sorority Shining Emerald Award and the Kappa Delta Chi Unity, Honesty, Integrity and Leadership Regional Award.

PHOTOS PHIL SHOCKLEY AND GARY LAWSON

Spears Business’ top seniors The Spears School of Business honors the top five seniors from each of its eight academic departments each year.

The honorees and their hometowns (all Oklahoma unless otherwise noted) for 2020: ACCOUNTING Bethanie Cannon, Stillwater Cordell (Corey) Collins, Yukon Julia DuBois, Shady Point Tamara Redmond, Jenks Treyton Reeves, Gans ECONOMICS Coleman Bourke, Tulsa Lauren Eberhart, Justin, Texas Sinclaire Johnson, Longwood, Florida Whitney Martin, Lawton Michael (Nathan) Moore, Arcadia

TREYTON REEVES

Gans, Oklahoma An accounting major, Reeves was a four-year member of the Oklahoma State University men’s basketball team, served as secretary and men’s basketball representative on the Student Athlete Advisory Committee, was a founding member of the OSU chapter of the Student Center for Public Trust and a member of Beta Alpha Psi. He volunteered at the Special Olympics Summer Games and Our Daily Bread Food and Resource Center and participated in Coaches vs. Cancer events. Reeves was a Spears Business Top 5 Accounting Senior, a twotime Academic All-Big 12 First Team member, a two-time Arthur Ashe Jr. Sport Scholar Award first team member, a National Association of Basketball Coaches Honors Court and received the Dr. Gerald Lage Academic Achievement Award.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP Brandon Cates, Fort Worth, Texas Seth Golden, Ovilla, Texas Sydney Hammond, Edmond Miranda Jones, Stillwater Jacob Swanson, Lawton FINANCE Dexter Flick, Olathe, Colorado Carlos Gilson, Katy, Texas Zane Maltz, Guthrie MacGregor Price, Stillwater Sotheby Shedeck, Yukon

MANAGEMENT AND GENERAL BUSINESS Megan Briscoe, Newcastle Rachel Brown, Goldthwaite, Texas Maggie Conners, Overland Park, Kansas Michelle Forsland, Sofiemyr, Norway Ashleigh Warren, Skiatook MARKETING AND INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS Henry Cannon, Lenexa, Kansas Kate Carson, Bixby Justine Gramling, Guthrie Trevor Holley, Talala Philip Sutton, Skiatook MANAGEMENT SCIENCE AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS Connor Cunningham, Vici Jacob Friedberg, Mansfield, Texas Dylan Hixson-Lewis, Tulsa Rachel Martin, Stillwater Hadley Reuter, Stillwater

HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM MANAGEMENT Alyssa Garner, McKinney, Texas Nico Gerbrecht, Ingelheim, Germany Ashley Patel, Broken Bow Makenna Russell, Broken Arrow Mackenzie Yandell, Wichita Falls, Texas

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 55

RETIREMENTS

Dr. Hailin Qu closes 40-year career

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r. Hailin Qu will retire July 1 after teaching hospitality and tourism management courses and conducting research for 40 years, including the last 21 at Oklahoma State University, where he is a Regents Professor, holds the William E. Davis Distinguished Chair and serves as director of the Center for Hospitality and Tourism Research.

Born and raised in Shanghai, China, he came to the United States in 1987. He earned a bachelor’s degree in hotel and restaurant management from Northern Arizona University (1987) and master’s (1989) and doctoral degrees (1992) from Purdue University.

Qu has been honored with several national and international awards, including the John Wiley and Sons Lifetime Research Achievement Award from the International Council on Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Education and the Michael D. Olsen Research Achievement Award, both in 2008. He also received these OSU honors: Eminent Faculty Award (2011), Regents Distinguished Research Award (2005 and 2016), Founder’s Award for Lifetime Contributions (2012), Regents Distinguished Teaching Award (2009) and many others.

How did you end up at OSU? Where else have you taught?

I was invited and recruited by former (School of Hotel and Restaurant Administration) director Dr. Pat Moreo in 1999. I previously taught at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (19921996) as an assistant professor and San Francisco State University (1996-1999) as an associate professor.

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What’s been the most rewarding aspect of teaching?

The most rewarding aspects of teaching and research are that I am paid to do what I love and am passionate to influence, shape and affect future generations’ lives and futures; secondly, every day is different and exciting for me to meet and inspire exciting and impressionable people; finally, I feel that I create lasting memories to cherish forever.

What was the favorite class you taught? Why? My favorite class I have taught is the graduate Research Methods class. I love and am passionate in the subject area and have taught this class for 22 years.

It is my passion to share my research experiences with graduate students, and teaching this class is the best place to motivate and encourage graduate students in conducting research and to see their learning and practicing.

What will you miss most in your time away from OSU? I will miss interacting with my students, especially teaching and working with graduate students in conducting research and discovery. It is one of the most important reasons for attracting me to join OSU 21 years ago. I also will miss my colleagues and friends at OSU and hospitality and tourism educators/ researchers worldwide.

What would you want people to know about your career?

He is one of the outstanding and leading scholars and teachers in hospitality and tourism management worldwide with a successful academic career, and he loves research and discovery and cares about his students and colleagues.

What are your plans for retirement?

I will continue supporting HTM programs, conducting research and publication with other scholars and students, and give seminars and workshops on research and publications globally. I am expecting a grandchild and will be very happy to enjoy my grandparent’s life.

STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTO SPEARS BUSINESS

Dr. Jim Fain taught at OSU for 34 years

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r. Jim Fain retired June 1 after teaching economics at Oklahoma State University for 34 years.

Fain grew up in Stephenville, Texas, and earned his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Texas (1982) before attending Purdue University for graduate studies.

After graduating from Purdue with master’s (1983) and doctoral degrees (1986) in economics, he accepted a teaching position at OSU. He spent his entire teaching career in Stillwater, serving as head of the Department of Economics for six years (2008-2014) and as the department’s graduate coordinator for four years (2004-08).

Fain received several teaching honors over the years, including the Kenneth and Leitner Greiner Undergraduate Teaching Award for excellence in the classroom (1997) and the Merrick Foundation Teaching Award for outstanding achievement in bringing about a better understanding and appreciation of the American free enterprise system (1995).

How did you end up at OSU? Where else have you taught?

This was my first — and evidently last — job out of grad school.

What’s been the most rewarding aspect of teaching in the Spears School?

Interacting with my wonderful colleagues in the economics department.

What was the favorite class you taught? Why? Labor Economics. This was usually a smallish class with a high concentration of econ majors. Since everybody works

STORY TERRY TUSH | PHOTO GARY LAWSON

at some point in their lives, the topics in a labor class tend to resonate.

How is teaching different today than it was when you arrived at OSU in 1986?

I arrived in August 1986. That summer, the College of Business had purchased and installed computers for all faculty members for the first time, which was a big deal. The computers were slow and not networked (because that was not a thing yet), and we had low-resolution, monochrome monitors (but you did have a choice of green or orange display).

The internet as we know it did not yet exist, and any serious computing was done on OSU’s mainframe computer. The classrooms had no computers, no projecting equipment and no internet connection, but they did have blackboards, and some had overhead projectors (the kind you lay a transparency on). To teach, most people talked a lot and used a piece of chalk to write on the board. Since there were few tools one could use, being good at verbal communication was essential.

The contrast to today’s teaching environment is striking. Today, there are many tools and, in my discipline at least, learning is more visually oriented than it was when I started. The availability of internet-based homework that is tied to the book has changed the teaching process considerably.

What are your plans for retirement?

Before the coronavirus, the plan was to travel with my wife, Lisa. Those plans might be put on hold for a while. Other than that, nothing specific.

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Faculty and staff members honored at convocation

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he Spears School of Business was well represented at the annual University Awards Convocation ceremony Dec. 11, where several faculty and staff were recognized for their contributions to the school’s success.

“Spears Business is very fortunate to have so many outstanding staff and faculty,” said Ken Eastman, dean of the business school. “We are very proud of the Spears personnel who were recognized at this year’s convocation ceremony as it is a fitting recognition of their excellent work. They are great role models for all of us.”

Spears Business faculty honored were: • David Carter, Greg Massey Professor in the Department of Finance and Oklahoma Bankers Association Chair of Commercial Bank Management, was presented with the Outreach Faculty Excellence Award.

• Nancy Titus-Piersma, a lecturer in the Department of Finance, was presented with the Excellence in Teaching Award for Adjunct Faculty, given to a non-tenure track faculty member with three or more years of service.

• Ramesh Rao, professor in the Department of Finance and Paul C. Wise Chair of Finance, was recognized as a recipient of the Regents Distinguished Research Award, which recognizes faculty who have shown unusual, significant achievement in their field of research.

• Rathin Sarathy, professor in the Department of Management Science & Information Systems and Ardmore Chair, was awarded the Regents Distinguished Teaching Award for having shown significant achievement in the instruction of students.

• Wenyi Shen, assistant professor in the Department of Economics, received the Merrick Foundation Teaching Award for bringing a better understanding and appreciation of the American economic system.

• Betty Simkins, professor and head of the Department of Finance, Williams Cos. Chair, was named a Regents Professor.

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•

Angela Spencer, professor in the Department of Accounting and Lanny G. Chasteen Chair, was presented with the Award for Excellence in Academic Program Assessment, which recognizes those who demonstrate innovation, excellence and dedication to program outcomes assessment planning, reporting and implementation.

• Alexis Smith Washington, associate professor in the Department of Management, was honored with the Distinguished Early Career Faculty Award for recognition of faculty members who were awarded tenure within the past three years and demonstrate a strong potential for continued contributions to the university and to their profession in instruction, research and creative activity and outreach.

Spears Business staff honored were: • Cara Black, academic advisor, was given the Advising Excellence Award.

• Marissa McIntyre, director of student academic services, was awarded the Leave the Ladder Down Award given to one faculty member, one staff member and an administrator who have successfully mentored and encouraged others to reach their full potential.

In addition, the following Spears Business faculty were recognized for appointments to endowed chair and professorship positions: • Mehtabul Azam, associate professor of Business Administration • Matt Bowler, Ralph A. and Peggy A. Brenneman Professorship • Laurie Lucas, Endowed Professorship in Applied Business Ethics • Li Miao, Charles W. Lanphere Professorship • Curtis Moore, Mike and Robbie Holder Chair in Entrepreneurship • Marc Tower, Norman C. Stevenson Chair in Entrepreneurship • Alexis Smith Washington, William S. Spears Chair in Business Administration

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS GARY LAWSON

David Carter: Outreach Faculty Excellence Award.

Nancy Titus-Piersma: Excellence in Teaching Award for Adjunct Faculty.

Ramesh Rao: Regents Distinguished Research Award.

Rathin Sarathy: Regents Distinguished Teaching Award.

Wenyi Shen: Merrick Foundation Teaching Award.

Betty Simkins: Named a Regents Professor.

Angela Spencer: Award for Excellence in Academic Program Assessment.

Alexis Smith Washington: Distinguished Early Career Faculty Award.

Cara Black: Advising Excellence Award.

Marissa McIntyre: Leave the Ladder Down Award.

Li Miao: Named to the Charles W. Lanphere Professorship.

Marc Tower: Named to the Norman C. Stevenson Chair in Entrepreneurship.

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Memories Burning Bright Leaving Oklahoma for career and family couldn’t dim 100-year-old’s pride in OSU

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klahoma State University alumna Betty Thomas had much to celebrate April 25 at her home in Denver, where she has lived for nearly 70 years. At her 100th birthday celebration, she was surrounded by her immediate family and received many more birthday wishes from extended family across the U.S. and around the world. And despite worries about the coronavirus, Thomas relished celebrating with her family.

“I’m fortunate to be able to still live in my own home by myself, and my three children, who all live within a mile of me, are a big help, of course,” Thomas said.

Though Thomas has spent most of her life in Colorado now, the Oklahoma native graduated in 1941 from what was then Oklahoma A&M College.

And with a brother and sister who graduated from A&M and many other extended family members who attended, including two current students, Thomas is part of a deep family legacy of OSU graduates.

“All of our relatives had gone to OU, but we decided to go to Oklahoma A&M and were very happy there, and all three of us got our degrees there,” she said. “But that made us the black sheep of the family.”

Born Betty Jonas, she grew up in Carney, Oklahoma, where her father owned the local bank.

She started at A&M in 1937, a year after her sister, Dorothy Jonas (Lyon). Both girls pledged with Chi Omega sorority. Betty is particularly proud that she has a great-grandnephew and great-grandniece, Justin and Katie Schwarz, who are current OSU students.

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“My grandniece at OSU was a freshman this year, and she pledged Chi Omega and is following in the family’s footsteps,” Thomas said.

Thomas studied business at what was then called the School of Commerce, where she was involved in freshman and sophomore honor societies, the Mortar Board national student honor society her senior year, the Commerce Student Council and a commerce student honor society.

In 1938, she was elected band queen and ended up traveling and marching with the A&M band at athletic events and competitions.

Following her graduation in May 1941, Thomas went to work for Carter Oil Co. in Tulsa, which later became Exxon Oil Co., as secretary to the vice president of marketing. Just a few months into her job, on Dec. 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, dragging the United States into World War II. Soon, most of the country’s young men joined the military to fight in the war.

“Practically all the guys I had known at A&M were in ROTC, and when they graduated, they got their commissions as second lieutenants and served in the war,” Thomas said. “Almost everyone I knew at A&M went to the war. It was a difficult time.”

Thomas’s future husband also served in World War II. John Foster Thomas was from Kansas and after graduating from Kansas State University, he also went to work for Carter Oil. He took a leave of absence to join the military and was overseas for four years during the war. He met Betty after returning home and resuming his job with the oil company. The two married on Oct. 12, 1947, and were transferred to Denver soon after. He died in 1980.

Betty’s son Tim said his mother has been the matriarch of their family since her older sister,

STORY JEFF JOINER | PHOTOS COURTESY TIM THOMAS

Betty Thomas with her children who were on hand to help her celebrate her 100th birthday in Colorado in April. Standing is Greg (left) and Tim Thomas, while sitting is daughter Jill Thomas Moore. Betty (below) talked to family members online from across the country and the world on her birthday.

Dorothy, died several years ago. The 100th birthday celebration was a happy gathering of the family despite the coronavirus. Tim and his siblings, Jill Thomas Moore and Greg Thomas, brought their spouses and family members to celebrate with their mother.

“It was kind of overwhelming everything that my family did,” Thomas said. “I was sorry that two of my granddaughters couldn’t be here, but my grandson and my other granddaughter were here, so that was good.”

Thomas recalled that the last time she was on the Stillwater campus was on the 50th anniversary of her graduation in 1991. And before that, she regularly attended Chi Omega reunions in Tulsa.

“For many years I went back for reunions with my sorority sisters, and I kept in touch with many of them for a long time,” Thomas said. “The sorority and OSU are a big part of my life. I had good experiences there.”

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BRIEFS

NATIONAL GROUP HONORS SPEARS BUSINESS PROGRAM The Center for Executive and Professional Development (CEPD) in the Spears School of Business received the 2020 Outstanding Noncredit Program Award.

The OSU Introductory Tribal Finance and Accounting Certificate program was recognized as the nation’s best by the University Professional and Continuing Education Association (UPCEA).

The OSU Introductory Tribal Finance and Accounting Certificate program was developed by CEPD, the outreach arm of Spears Business, in cooperation with the Oklahoma Tribal Finance Consortium and the Native American Finance Officers Association. Last fall, the finance and accounting program received the 2019 Central Regional Outstanding Noncredit Program Award

from UPCEA, qualifying it for the national honor.

“Winning the award at the regional level was impressive but winning now at the national level is amazing,” said Ken Eastman, dean of Spears Business.

“The credit for developing such a great program goes to Lindsey Ray and her colleagues in our Center for Executive and Professional Development.

“The CEPD staff works diligently to connect Spears Business with business professionals and we appreciate their willingness to track trends and deliver programs that meet evolving business needs. Winning the national award several times is evidence of their expertise and professionalism.”

More than 25 tribes and tribal organizations sent participants to

the OSU conference for entry-level employees and professionals needing increased knowledge about tribal finance and accounting and elected tribal officials and leaders who wished to better understand the financial side of tribal programs.

It’s not the first time that the Spears Business outreach group has been recognized with the national outreach award by UPCEA. The Tulsa Business Forums (1988), Europe ’92: The New American Challenge Teleconference (1991) and the Oklahoma Partnership Program, now known as the Executive Education Partnership Program (1997), were OSU programs to receive noncredit programming awards from the national group.

MANAGEMENT RESEARCH TOPS BIG 12 SCHOOLS The Department of Management at the Spears School of Business was ranked 12th in the nation for publishing in top-tier management journals for 2019. The TAMUGA rankings (a joint effort by Texas A&M University and the University of Georgia) placed the productivity of the department’s researchers at the top of the Big 12 Conference.

“When you look at publications per faculty member, OSU performed even better,” said Dr. James Pappas, head of the Department of Management at Spears Business. “Our faculty ranked sixth out of the top 150 business schools

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for faculty productivity, which was also first in the Big 12 conference.”

In a second business school research productivity ranking recently conducted by the University of Texas in Dallas, Spears Business management researchers ranked 23rd nationally for the most recent five-year period (2015-2019). During this period, the management department published 17 articles in the top two journals in the field, the Strategic Management Journal and the Academy of Management Journal.

“We focus on these journals because they are the industry standard. During this five-year period, our faculty

produced 17 publications, placing us first in the Big 12 and outpacing larger schools like the University of Texas in Austin and Texas Christian University,” Pappas said.

“I am incredibly grateful for the stewardship of Spears Dean Ken Eastman and Vice Dean Ramesh Sharda for their steadfast investment in scholarship, but I am also humbled and honored to work with faculty who are continuously motivated to pursue cutting-edge business research.”

See the complete rankings at okla.st/tamuga20 and okla.st/utd.

CAGLES SPONSOR RANCH BRANDING CONTEST

Cindy and Roger Cagle visit with an OSU student while judging posters with marketing concepts for their Texas ranch. The Cagles sponsored a contest last year for students at Oklahoma State to come up with new branding for the ranch. Spears Business student McKenzie Meuleveld (below) won the competition.

Oklahoma State University alumnus Roger Cagle and his wife, Cindy Cagle, sponsored a competition last fall for OSU students to create a brand campaign for the couple’s Texas ranch. The Cagles were on hand at the Business Building Dec. 6 to judge competition finalists and present a $1,000 first prize to the winning proposal and $500 to a Fan Favorite winner.

The Cagles teamed up with the OSU Marketing Club for a competition for students to create a brand for their High C’s Ranch in Texas, where they raise cattle. The event attracted 44 entries.

Students were asked to create a logo for the ranch and show its possible use on clothing, merchandise and on a website. They were also required to create a literal cattle brand that could be used by the Cagles to mark their herd. The competition was open to members of the Marketing Club.

PHOTOS JEFF JOINER

Winning first place was McKenzie Meuleveld, a Spears Business finance and marketing analytics major.

“I really wanted to take more of a modern approach to their logo,” Meuleveld said. “They said they were focused on bringing in that younger generation and I really thought a modern approach would do that. I also looked into the rules and regulations in Texas for cattle brands because I wanted to make sure what I was sending them was something they could get approved.”

The winner of the Fan Favorite Award was Rusty Ham. Cagle, a 1973 bachelor’s in business administration and 1975 MBA graduate, and his wife and business partner recently retired from the oil and gas industry after more than 40 years working throughout the world.

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BRIEFS

RIATA BUSINESS PLAN COMPETITION NAMES WINNERS The School for Entrepreneurship and the Riata Center for Entrepreneurship awarded $45,000 in prizes to the winners of the Riata Business Plan Competition at the event finals in January.

This year’s competition, open to all OSU students, attracted 30 entries in three business tracks: Main Street Lifestyle businesses with products or services for a larger market; High Tech businesses with an intellectual property or technology component; and Social Enterprises that offer solutions to social, cultural or environmental issues.

“The Riata Business Plan Competition was very successful this year,” said Marc Tower, executive director of the Riata Center. “We had a record number of applicants, and the high quality of the student ventures this year is a reflection of their hard work and the excellent advice they’re receiving from faculty and community mentors.”

3. Jdiobe Food Industries, Muwanika Jdiobe (master’s in mechanical and aerospace engineering).

First-place winners received $6,000 followed by $3,000 for second place and $2,000 for third. Semifinalists were awarded $1,000 each. Jackson Moore, founder of BikeSafe, won the $3,000 Richard L. Tourtellotte Family Scholarship, awarded to encourage business creation in Oklahoma and academic study of how governments and the private sector can work together to grow local economies and create jobs.

THE WINNERS: Main Street Lifestyle 1. Deox, Joshua Martinez (MBA), Josh Hawkins (MBA and marketing analytics), Daniel Archer (chemical engineering and pre-med) and Katie Kuzdak (MBA).

2. Mont Capital Partners, Austin Patton (accounting), Tom Campbell (finance) and Dalton Dison (agricultural business).

3. Rip Dip Sip, Reid Riseling (entrepreneurship) and Michael Buckley (entrepreneurship and marketing).

High Tech 1. Paldara Inc., William Colton (microbiology) and Beau Blanchard (master’s in entrepreneurship).

2. Whisk, Henry Cannon (marketing and nonprofit management).

3. Ndiglo Therapeutics, Brittany Laub (MBA) and Alvin Ngo (mechanical and aerospace engineering).

Social Enterprise 1. Strides, Rachel Brown (entrepreneurship and nonprofit management).

2. EmPads, Angela Peter (chemical engineering).

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Main Street Lifestyle winner Deox.

High Tech winner Paldara Inc.

Social Enterprise winner Strides.

PHOTOS CAITLIN SHOGREN

SHARDA NAMED AIS FELLOW Dr. Ramesh Sharda was one of two Americans named a 2019 Fellow of the Association for Information Systems (AIS) at its International Conference in Information Systems in Munich, Germany, in December.

The AIS Fellow Award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the information systems discipline in terms of research, teaching and service.

Vice dean for graduate programs and research in the Spears School of Business and Regents Professor of Management Science and Information Systems, Sharda was also named a fellow of the international society for practitioners of operations research,

PHOTO JEFF JOINER

management science and analytics known as INFORMS in 2018. He is only the third person to be recognized as a fellow by both organizations.

“This is a historic honor for Dr. Sharda,” said Dr. Rick Wilson, head of the Spears Business Department of Management Science and Information Systems. “It is well deserved, given Ramesh’s many significant contributions to the information systems field.

And being named a fellow by both organizations is akin to being inducted into the baseball and basketball hall of fames and speaks to his amazing interdisciplinary contributions.”

Sharda joined OSU as an assistant professor in 1980 following completion

of his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His tenure at OSU’s business school includes a robust research career in data science, analytics and decision making leading to more than 250 published articles resulting in more than 1,000 citations.

He has also co-authored well-known textbooks in the field, one now in its 11th edition.

Sharda’s other honors include receiving the OSU Regents Distinguished Research Award twice (2003 and 2016) and being inducted into the Oklahoma Higher Education Hall of Fame in 2016.

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BRIEFS

THREE INDUCTEES REPRESENT SPEARS BUSINESS IN OSU HALL OF FAME CLASS Three Spears School of Business alumni were inducted into the Oklahoma State University Alumni Association Hall of Fame in February as part of the 2020 class: Linda Parrack Livingstone, president of Baylor University; the late Neal L. Patterson, co-founder of Cerner Corp.; and Bruce T. Benbrook, chairman and CEO of Stock Exchange Bank.

Induction into the OSU Hall of Fame is the university’s highest honor. It recognizes alumni and former students with outstanding lifetime achievements in society and professional life.

Livingstone graduated from OSU in 1982 with a bachelor’s degree in economics and management followed by a master’s degree in business administration in 1983 and a doctorate

in management and organizational behavior in 1992. She is the 15th president of Baylor University and the school’s first female head. Livingstone was inducted into the Spears School of Business Hall of Fame in 2013 and received its first Outstanding Ph.D. Award. She lives in Waco, Texas, with her husband, Brad. They have one daughter, Shelby.

Patterson graduated from OSU in 1971 with a bachelor’s degree in finance followed by a master’s degree in business administration in 1973. He rose to prominence as chairman and chief executive officer of Cerner Corp., a health information technology company he co-founded in 1979. Patterson died of cancer at age 67 in 2017.

Benbrook graduated from OSU in 1976 with a bachelor’s degree in finance. After graduation, he returned to Woodward, Oklahoma, to work at the family-owned Stock Exchange Bank, where he has served as chairman and CEO since 1981.

Benbrook has given extensively to his alma mater and held numerous leadership positions, including as chairman of the OSU/A&M Board of Regents in 1994. He is also a former president of the OSU Alumni Association. He was selected as one of the Spears Tributes: 100 For 100 during the school’s centennial celebration in 2014. Benbrook and his wife, Sheryl, have two daughters, Rachel and Julia, and all are graduates of OSU.

From left: Linda Parrack Livingstone, Bruce T. Benbrook and the late Neal L. Patterson.

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PHOTO/GRAPHIC CAITLIN SHOGREN

Scholars Drs. James Lammendole (left) and Kevin Fandl, both from Temple University, discuss presentations at OSU’s 2020 research symposium on opportunities and barriers to cannabis businesses in legalized markets.

Cannabis Concerns

Scholars at OSU symposium examine the growing business climate for marijuana

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he Center for Legal Studies & Business Ethics at Oklahoma State University’s Spears School of Business hosted a research symposium on an issue of growing interest among legal scholars across the country.

The symposium, “Legal, Ethical, and Compliance Issues in Emerging Markets: Cannabis in the States,” held Feb. 28-29 in Oklahoma City, was the center’s first research symposium since its launch in 2019. Nearly three dozen scholars from across the U.S. and Canada presented papers.

The center, which enhances business and professional ethics and regulatory compliance by exploring issues at the intersections of law and business, co-hosted the event with the American Business Law Journal, published by the Academy of Legal Studies and Business.

The District of Columbia and 33 states, including Oklahoma, have legalized cannabis in some form, though it remains illegal under federal law.

This conflict creates uncertainty for regulators, producers, consumers and other stakeholders. Oklahoma legalized medical marijuana use in 2018 and now leads the nation on a per-capita basis for the number of licensed dispensaries in the state, and more than 240,000 Oklahomans have a medical marijuana card. The state collected nearly $55 million in taxes from more than $345 million in sales in 2019.

“A key part of the center’s mission is to support applied and theoretical research that brings value to our understanding of how the law may create opportunities for competitive advantage in any industry” said Laurie Lucas, chair of business ethics and a Spears Business associate professor of legal studies.

“The symposium’s common element was the cannabis industry, but the real issues were related to the legal, ethical and compliance problems within that emerging and disruptive industry.”

Presenters included experts in law, finance, banking, tax, entrepreneurship, medical research, international trade, marketing and ethics. Paper topics included issues related to international law, finance and banking, taxation, product marketing, human resources, health issues, professional ethics and ethical theory.

“What made this symposium so successful was the diversity of thought and the interdisciplinary approaches taken by these scholars,” Lucas said.

“That diversity around a common topic, I hope, created a synergy for the participants, which may ultimately add value to their scholarship.”

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HALL OF FAME

SCH OO L O F ACCO U NTIN G TO H O N O R FIVE

THE WILTON T. ANDERSON HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES FOR 2020

Stephen (Steve) Jay

Dr. Janet Kimbrell

DISTINGUISHED FRIENDS OF THE SCHOOL OF ACCOUNTING HONOREE

Dr. Bob Sandmeyer

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Jeff Ronsse

THE EARLY CAREER RISING STAR

Michael Madsen

PHOTOS SPEARS BUSINESS AND PHIL SHOCKLEY

OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSIT Y’S SCHOOL OF ACCOUNTING WILL HONOR FIVE OUTSTANDING ALUMNI AND FRIENDS OF THE SCHOOL IN 2021 AFTER THIS YEAR’S WILTON T. ANDERSON HALL OF FAME AND AWARDS BANQUET WAS POSTPONED BECAUSE OF THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC .

THIS YEAR’S HONOREES WILL BE RECOGNIZED AT THE 2021 BANQUET.

STEPHEN (STEVE) JAY, a two-time OSU accounting graduate with bachelor’s (1967) and master’s (1969) degrees, is a semi-retired CPA in Tulsa.

Jay began his accounting career with Haskins and Sells in Houston after graduating from OSU. He was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army in 1969 and served one year in Vietnam, receiving the Bronze Star.

He was hired by Arthur Young and Co. in Tulsa in 1971 before becoming a partner in Lohrey and Jay in Tulsa. In 1988, he formed Jay & Associates P.C., and he currently serves as an advisor to two CPA firms owned by his sons, S. Neil Jay (1996 OSU graduate), and Matthew Jay (2007).

His experience includes accounting, taxation and auditing services for the petroleum, manufacturing, construction, banking and finance industries. He has been responsible for planning and supervision of tax engagements, compliance work, tax accruals and client representation before the IRS. Jay has served as an expert witness in federal and state courts and as a court-appointed trustee.

A Stillwater native, Jay has supported OSU from a very early age. He served as president of the Tulsa Chapter of the OSU Alumni Association and as a member of the OSU Alumni Association.

He and his wife, Nancy (OSU 1968), have been married 51 years and have five children and seven grandchildren.

DR. JANET KIMBRELL earned her doctorate in accounting from OSU in 1979 and taught accounting classes at OSU for 28 years until she retired in January 2007.

Prior to her career at OSU, Kimbrell taught mathematics in public school before pursuing a graduate degree in her first love — accounting.

She received a master’s degree at the University of Texas at Arlington and a doctorate in accounting at OSU. While an OSU faculty member, she received several awards and nominations, including Outstanding MBA Teacher and Outstanding

Business Faculty. She was the author of several articles in refereed journals and participated in the school’s Summer in London study abroad program.

Kimbrell is a member of Golden Key, Beta Gamma Sigma and Beta Alpha Psi honorary societies and was a member of the American Accounting Association, American Institute of CPAs and Oklahoma Society of CPAs. While living in Stillwater, she was an active member of the Stillwater Lions Club, including serving as president.

JEFF RONSSE, an OSU accounting and marketing graduate (1999), is the managing partner for the Colorado and Utah offices of BKD, a national CPA and advisory firm.

Ronsse moved to Colorado in 2017 and leads the Denver and Colorado Springs offices of BKD. In 2019, he helped BKD acquire its Salt Lake City office. In almost three years of Ronsse’s leadership, the BKD Colorado-Salt Lake City practice has grown 70 percent.

He started his career in BKD’s Tulsa office, where he led a team that grew the Oklahoma offices’ commercial audit practice from a small segment to the largest portion of the overall revenue base for Oklahoma. In 2012, Ronsse was elected to BKD partnership and appointed the accounting and audit director for the firm’s three Oklahoma offices (Tulsa, Enid and Oklahoma City).

Ronsse has received numerous recognitions over the years. He was presented the 2004 BKD PRIDE Award for exemplifying the firm’s PRIDE values, which is BKD’s pinnacle award. He was recognized by the Tulsa Business Journal as one of the 40 Under 40 and is a graduate of Leadership Tulsa (Class 41). He also received a 2013 Oklahoma Society of CPAs Trailblazer award and a 2015 Spears School Outstanding Young Alumni award.

He is a member of the American Institute of CPAs, Colorado Society of CPAs and Oklahoma Society of CPAs. He also serves on the OSU School of Accounting Advisory Board.

Ronsse, his wife, Heather, and their three boys reside in Colorado.

B U S I N E S S .O K S TAT E . E D U 69

HALL OF FAME

DR. BOB SANDMEYER spent 17 years (197794) as dean of the OSU College of Business Administration (now the Spears School of Business) and led the effort for the OSU accounting department to be recognized as the School of Accounting.

Sandmeyer earned both his master’s degree (1958) and doctorate (1962) in economics from OSU. In 1962, he joined the OSU economics faculty as a visiting assistant professor and was appointed an assistant professor in 1963. He served as the first director of Graduate Studies in Economics and as the first director of the Office of Business and Economic Research.

He was appointed dean of the college in August 1977 and served until he retired in September 1994.

Sandmeyer’s 17-year tenure is second only to Dean Raymond D. Thomas’ 28 years of service. The OSU School of Accounting first earned accreditation, separate from other college programs, from AACSB International under Sandmeyer.

Sandmeyer received many awards and recognition over the years, including his induction into the Spears School of Business Hall of Fame, the Oklahoma Higher Education Hall of Fame, and the Fort Hays State Award. In recognition of his distinguished international service, Sandmeyer was appointed a Henry G. Bennett Fellow in the OSU School of International Studies.

He and his wife, Loretta, were married 68 years prior to her death in 2018. He has four children, four grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

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MICHAEL MADSEN, a 2008 OSU accounting graduate, is a BKD director who invests significant time at his alma mater and other colleges and universities as the recruiting director for BKD’s Oklahoma offices.

Madsen has more than a decade of experience in audit and assurance services, and he is a member of the BKD National Public Sector Group and the BKD National Not-for-Profit Group. He focuses on serving Native American tribes and their gaming and other business enterprises, including directing audits for several of the state’s largest tribes.

He is a member of the American Institute of CPAs and Oklahoma Society of CPAs, where he serves on the Governmental Accounting and Auditing Committee and has presented at multiple conferences. The OSCPA honored him as a 2018 Trailblazer Award recipient. Madsen actively participates with the Native American Finance Officers Association, the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association, the Oklahoma Tribal Gaming Regulators Association and the Oklahoma Tribal Finance Consortium.

Madsen is currently a member of Leadership Tulsa (Class 62) and board chairman for the Mental Health Association Oklahoma. He is a founding member of Tulsa Area United Way’s Emerging Leaders Society and a member with TYPros (Tulsa Young Professionals). He is a member of the OSU School of Accounting Advisory Board, the OSU Tribal Gaming/Casino Advisory Board and the OSU Spears School of Business Dean’s Council (2019). He has been an instructor for OSU’s Advanced Tribal Certificate Program and SOA Graduate Program Practicum Course.

He and his wife, Stephanie, have three boys.

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