Accounting Faculty Participate in ArchiTECH Competition

Three teams of Drexel LeBow professors and students are dividing $30,000 in winnings for their proposed course innovations that take advantage of the technology and other enhancements featured in the College’s new 12-story academic center opening this fall. Nearly two dozen teams competed in the Classroom ArchiTECH contest, including our very own faculty members, Barbara Grein, Hubert Glover and Jennifer Wright.

While they didn’t take top prize, they all said how they enjoyed participating and stretching their imaginations in a different way.

First place was awarded to the team proposing to use interactive video conferencing to more closely connect undergraduate students who manage a portion of Drexel’s endowment with the investment professionals who provide feedback and advice to the students. The finance classes in “applied portfolio management” oversee investment decisions for the Dragon Fund, a $1 million pool within the University’s endowment.

Allowing students to make online presentations about their analyses and stock picks, in addition to in-person presentations, will expand the number of professional investment advisors who can participate, and the sessions will be recorded for later observation and critique by students and professors, said finance faculty Daniel Dorn and Ed Nelling. The third member of their team was undergraduate David Hunt.

Each team in the competition consisted of two professors and one student, and each team’s winnings are distributed evenly among the team members. Classrooms in the new building, Gerri C. LeBow Hall, will be equipped with video teleconferencing, the ability to make video recordings of lectures, on-screen notation capabilities and a full complement of computer, video playback and online access.

Second place was awarded to professors Daniel Korschun and Stephen Joyce, who along with undergraduate Ryan Bertoldi proposed enhancing classroom instruction by having students identify moments in films, music or other entertainment that demonstrate business principles, and then showing and discussing those clips in class.

Third place went to professors Trina Larsen Andras and Larry Duke, with Ph.D. student Brooke Reavey, for their proposal to use the new building’s behavioral lab to train students how to run focus groups and allow students to engage in role-play for classes that teach negotiating strategies.

“Having professors and students together on the same teams was a bit of ‘reverse mentoring,’” said Frank Linnehan, the interim dean of Drexel University’s LeBow College of Business. “Our professors know their disciplines but it’s the students who really know what the technology is capable of. We asked students to advise their professors on how to get the most out of the new teaching tools and classrooms.”