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SIMON SCHOOL COMMENCEMENT 2008

Author:Charla Stevens Kucko, (585) 273-4806

Release Date: May 30, 2008

Rochester, N.Y.—May 29, 2008—The Simon Graduate School of Business at the University of Rochester will hold Commencement ceremonies on Sunday, June 8, 2008, at 10 a.m. in the Eastman Theatre in Rochester, N.Y. President Joel Seligman will preside. Additional facts of interest are as follows:

  • J. Peter Simon, co-chairman of William E. Simon and Sons and chair of the Simon School’s Executive Advisory Committee, will receive an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree and deliver the Commencement Address. Simon cofounded the firm with his father, the late William E. Simon and his brother, Bill Simon Jr. Peter Simon has coupled a successful business career with a deep commitment to public service through philanthropy and involvement in education at the leadership level. A psychology and religion major at Lafayette College, he began his investment career at Kidder Peabody in New York City, rising to managing director in the convertible securities department. Since his father’s death, he has continued the family’s deep interest in the Simon School. As chair of the Executive Advisory Committee, he has engaged the group’s national business and education leaders, stimulating increased involvement in strategic planning, financial support and events. On a personal level, he meets with current M.B.A. students, hires and helps graduates find jobs, and encourages new recruits to join the program. To help attract the very best candidates to the Simon School’s M.B.A. program, the Simon Foundation has funded William E. Simon Leadership Fellowships for more than 30 exceptional students. (A full biography is available upon request.)
  • Kathy N. Waller, B.A. ’80, M.B.A. ’83, vice president and chief of internal audit for The Coca-Cola Company, will be presented the Distinguished Alumna Award. After graduating from the University of Rochester with a degree in history, she first worked in the budget bureau for the City of Rochester. After discovering that she thoroughly enjoyed finance, she laid aside plans to pursue a law degree and instead returned to the University to earn her M.B.A. After graduating from the Simon School, she worked as a public accountant for Deloitte Haskins and Sells in Rochester and later, moved into a variety of senior finance positions at Coca-Cola in her native Atlanta. While a student at Simon, she earned her M.B.A. as a fellow of the Consortium for Graduate Study in Management. A member of the University board of trustees and the Simon School Executive Advisory Committee, Waller is also an active member of the University’s Multicultural Alumni Advisory Council, a past president of the University’s Atlanta Regional Alumni Council, and has hosted numerous events in Atlanta for the Simon School and the University. (A full biography is available upon request.)
  • The Philip T. Meyers Scholarship and Hugh H. Whitney awards will be presented, respectively, to the graduating students with the highest record of academic achievement in the Full-Time M.B.A. Program and the Executive M.B.A. Program.
  • The John M. Brophy award will be presented to the graduating student with the highest record of academic achievement in the Part-Time M.B.A. Program.
  • The Karl Brunner Award will be presented to the graduating non-U.S. student with the highest record of academic achievement in the Full-Time M.B.A. Program.
  • There will be a special presentation at Commencement honoring the late Simon School Professor Michael J. Barclay who died in a seaplane crash near Irondequoit Bay in Penfield last August.

Among the graduating students are:

  • Eric J. Allen ’08, a native of Montezuma, Iowa, currently living in Rochester, and Scott Sweeney ’08, originally from Batavia, N.Y., and currently living in Rochester, won the Babson National Entrepreneurship Contest in 2007, one of the most prestigious competitions of its kind in the nation, for their idea to create a specialized center for autism education and services excellence. Allen and Sweeney are still pursuing the opportunity. While at Simon, they also won the 2007 Mark Ain Business Plan Competition. Allen was also on a team that placed in the top 10 percent at the Darden 2006 International Innovation Challenge out of 400 teams, and his teams won the Simon School First-Year Case Competition, and the Simon Marketing Association Case Competition. He earned his M.B.A. on a full-tuition scholarship as a Simon Leadership Fellow, and served as president of the Simon Marketing Association, and a member of Simon Net Impact and Simon Entrepreneurs. During the second year of his M.B.A. studies, Allen’s wife, Ryan McGinn, gave birth to their first child, Samuel. He has been hired as a marketing manager at PepsiCo in Purchase, N.Y.
  • Sweeney took first place honors in the 2007 Unilever Summer Cook-off, and the Improving the Simon School competition. His professional career in golf course management led him to play instrumental roles in coordinating the 85th Annual PGA Championship and the 20th Annual Jim Kelly Celebrity Classic. His entrepreneurial efforts include management and consultation on projects ranging from a multimillion dollar start-up food and beverage operation to the development of educationally relevant social networking software. An avid traveler, Sweeney has spent time in 46 states, five Canadian provinces and 10 European countries. He begins work this summer as an associate brand manager for Unilever in New York City.
  • Suzanne DeMers ’08, a native of Pittsford, N.Y. who currently resides in Brighton, lived in many cities around the country following her undergraduate studies at Cornell University, until a pivotal moment changed the course of her life. While pursuing an M.B.A. at U.C.L.A.’s Anderson School of Management, she was recruited by one of Paul Allen’s groups in Seattle, Wash., to manage the design and construction of his new music and popular culture museum. Thirty years after graduating from Cornell, DeMers returned to Rochester to be closer to family and is finishing her Executive M.B.A. at the Simon School. A single mother of two children from China, DeMers adopted one of her children the summer after her first rigorous year at Simon. The oldest student in this year’s Executive M.B.A. program, she provides design and management services for architectural, exhibit design and other special projects.
  • Terrence Liverpool ’08, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y. currently living in Rochester, is a leader who, during his time as a student at the Simon School, was able to bring about change and make a significant impact on those around him. As president of the Simon National Black M.B.A. Association, and as a fellow of the Consortium for Graduate Study in Management. He served as vice president of both Simon Net Impact and the School’s student-run VISION Program, stressing the importance of promoting community both inside and outside the School. An active volunteer in the Rochester community, he worked as a member of the Pillars of Hope Program, which assists students in the Rochester City School District. This year at Simon, he arranged an alternative careers panel, which brought a dozen Simon alumni from various industries such as retail, fashion and real estate to speak with students. He also organized and led a Team M.B.A. event for the Rochester Clean Sweep project during Earth Week. Liverpool was raised in a single-parent household by his mother, a West Indian immigrant originally from Trinidad and Tobago. Having been exposed to the harsh realities of street violence and losing a cousin at the tender age of 17, his mother always instilled in him that education was the key to a successful future.
  • Lieutenant Timothy Shanley ’08, a native of Annapolis, Md. currently living in Rochester is the fifth boy in his family to earn an M.B.A. as well as a degree from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. His father also earned a degree there. After graduation, he will attend various Navy schools leading up to reporting aboard the U.S.S. Farragut as the operations officer. He will move to Jacksonville, Fla., with his wife, Emily, a former Naval officer, and their son, Timothy Francis Jr., and the couple is expecting their second child in the fall. During his time at Simon, Shanley interned for U.S. Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) on Capitol Hill, the Tesoro Corporation of San Antonio, Tex., and Geospatial Systems Inc. of Rochester. A recipient of the Harold J. and Marianna K. Sheehan Scholarship, he served as president of the Simon School’s Financial Management Association. Previously, Shanley was the navigator of the U.S.S. Cape St. George, based in Norfolk, Va. During his time on the “Cape,” he participated in Operation Iraqi Freedom (protecting the Al-Basrah Oil Terminal) as well as piracy suppression operations off the coast of Somalia. He was on orders to earn his M.B.A. at Simon through the Navy’s Surface Warfare Officer M.B.A. Program. Currently, his older brother, Gerard, is a commander in the Navy, stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, and his brother, Jay is a Naval commander is reporting to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba at the end of May.

Simon Class of 2008 Statistics

  • The Simon School Class of 2008 includes a total of 213 graduates of the full-time and part-time M.B.A programs (162 full-time and 51 part-time); 27 graduates of the Executive M.B.A. program; 73 graduates who will receive the M.S. degree in business administration and 5 graduates who will be awarded the Ph.D. in Business Administration. In addition, the Simon School’s Executive M.B.A. Program in Bern, Switzerland, will graduate 25 students.
  • The leading areas of concentration of this year’s full-time M.B.A. class are: finance, 44 percent; marketing, 14 percent; competitive and organizational strategy, 14 percent; and corporate accounting, 13 percent. (Graduates may have concentrations in as many as four disciplines). Other concentrations include operations management―services, operations management―manufacturing, health sciences management, entrepreneurship, and computers and information systems.
  • The leading areas of concentration of this year’s part-time M.B.A. class are: finance, 32 percent; competitive and organizational strategy, 30 percent; marketing, 9 percent; and corporate accounting, 7 percent. Other concentrations include public accounting, international management, operations management-manufacturing, operations management-services, computers and information systems, heath sciences management, and accounting and information systems.

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Media Note: To make special arrangements in advance for interviews, please call Charla Stevens Kucko, director of marketing and communications, at (585) 273-4806 or Dawn S. McWilliams, executive director of marketing and communications, at (585) 275-3735.

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The Simon School prides itself as the place Where Thinkers Become Leaders™ and is currently ranked among the leading graduate business schools in the world in rankings published by the popular press, including BusinessWeek, U.S. News & World Report, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times and Forbes. For example, the Financial Times recently rated the School 2nd in the world for finance and 5th in the world for managerial economics. More information about the Simon School is available on the World Wide Web at www.simon.rochester.edu.