MBA and Other Masters Degree Candidates Participate in Spring '10 Awards Ceremony
May 13, 2010
Immediately following spring commencement ceremonies on May 13, the more than 140 newly-minted MBAs, other graduates, family and friends joined School of Business faculty and administrators for an evening awards reception outside the School. Awards were presented to outstanding faculty and the top graduates in the various programs.
"While most of the recognition goes to you individually, we asked you to also identify those people whom you thought made a special difference to your experience," said Anuj Mehrotra, vice dean for graduate business programs, in opening remarks. "Today, we will be recognizing these individuals who were selected by each group."
The full-time MBA class honored Timothy Burch, associate professor of finance, as the outstanding faculty member among those teaching core classes and A. Parasuraman, holder of the James W. McLamore Chair in Marketing and a professor of marketing, as the outstanding elective course professor.
Special recognition was given to Ricardo Rodriguez, associate professor of finance for his role as a mentor, judge and advisor for teams in various MBA competitions including the ACG (Association of Corporate Growth) Cup competition, which the School's MBAs won two years in a row.
The top graduates were also presented with awards from their classmates. Those with the highest grade point averages earned the Valedictorian Award and those who demonstrated strong initiative, commitment, passion and leadership among their peers were presented with the Leadership Award.
Full-time MBA graduate Ricardo Veneziano de Oliveira was honored with his class's Valedictorian Award, while Robert Walker and Michele Brown both earned the Leadership Award for their cohorts.
Zeheria Brown was honored with the Leadership Award for the Tampa Executive MBA class, and Dietrich Zeledon received the award for the MBA for Working Professionals program.
Two other graduates honored in a separate ceremony were Rita Cabases who was honored as Who's Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges and Graham Tedesco who received a Graduate Award for Excellence.
