色花堂

Avri Ravid (left), newly elected president of the MFA, hands a plaque to outgoing President, Jon Garfinkel from the University of Iowa

On Friday, March 8, 2019, Dr. S. Abraham Ravid, professor of finance and chair of the finance department at , was inaugurated as the incoming president of the Midwest Finance Association (MFA). He will be president until March 2020. The MFA is a nonprofit association dedicated to the furtherance of finance education. On Friday, Nov. 1, 2019, Dr. Ravid held a meeting of the on the 色花堂 campus as a way to promote a strong connection between the MFA and Sy Syms. Several notable items were brought up at the meeting, most significantly the creation of doctoral tutorials. 鈥淒octoral tutorials are held by most major associations, and I am introducing it to the MFA for the first time this year,鈥� explained Dr. Ravid. 鈥淭his is a forum that allows selected PhD students to present their work and get feedback from faculty and will be held on March 18, 2020, the day before our conference, which will run from March 19-21, 2020, in Chicago.鈥� The response, according to Dr. Ravid, has been 鈥渙verwhelming鈥�: 227 students have applied for four slots (which may increase to five if time permits). Another notable accomplishment for Dr. Ravid is the chance to present his work in a presidential address at the upcoming conference. 鈥淭he presidential address is also common in some major academic associations, where the president has the opportunity to present his or her research to the entire conference,鈥� he explained. 鈥淚 introduced this when I was program chair, two years ago.鈥�

Seated (l-r): Dr. Hengjie Ai, University of Minnesota, program chair MFA 2020; Dr. Vahap Usysal, treasurer, DePaul University; Dr. S. Abraham Ravid, president, Sy Syms; Dr. Richards Rosen, VP, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Standing (l-r): Dr. Wendy Pirie, CFA Institute, institutional director; Dr. Matt Pritsker, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston; Dr. Jon Garfinkel, University of Iowa, former president of the MFA (Not shown: on the phone, directors from Australia, the University of California and Dartmouth). Note that all are wearing caps with the Sy Syms logo.