Winter graduation report

Features

26 January 2010

The short winter days and cold and wet weather were forgotten last week on the Warwick campus with the celebrations of Winter graduation. For WBS, 302 graduands, 565 guests and 65 staff attended the ceremony in the Warwick Arts Centre on Thursday, followed by a great buffet lunch in the Rootes Panorama Suite on campus. A similar number of students graduated 'in absentia'.

Several are noteworthy for their achievements above and beyond graduation.

Four MSc in Finance students won awards, presented at the lunch by Professor Mark Salmon, for their outstanding performances during their studies:

Best overall - Ngoc Quynh Anh Nguyen;
Best Investment Management Stream - Rajan Parmar;
Best Corporate Finance Stream - Áine Black;
Best dissertation - Carmen Boschmans.

Anh commented on her award, "When I opened the email from the programme team giving me the news that I had won the prize of Best Overall student, my first reaction was 'Are they sending this to the right person?!' Then I felt very happy that all my hard work was worth it. I am hoping for a career in treasury in the UK; so far the search for a job has been difficult, but this award will be of help to me."

Three students taking the MA in Industrial Relations and Personnel Management won awards. Joyce Chiang was awarded the Trades Union Congress Prize for Outstanding Attainment in Employment Rights, and Sophie Stuttard was awarded the Engineering Employers Federation Prize for Outstanding Attainment in Employment Relations. Leon Moorcroft was awarded the CIPD Achievement Prize.

The first cohort graduated from the newly-launched MSc in Business Analytics and Consulting. Ajit Veerappan from India is setting up his own consultancy. He reports, "Shortly before finishing my course, I decided to go ahead and start off a software firm in Bangalore, India. My passion for software combined with the business knowledge that I gained in Warwick motivated me to dream big and become an entrepreneur.

"Modules in my course such as Foundations of Management, Strategy Analysis, Supporting Strategy, and Decision Analysis Consulting helped me understand how to run a business and manage people. These modules also helped me in creating a strategy and direction for my firm.

"My company, AB Innovative, is an IT Services company which is 30 member strong now and has grown at a rapid pace with our employees having expertise in all platforms. We offer other IT services too - for example, a document management system, and website development for a number of clients.

"I would like to thank Warwick University and the staff in Warwick Business School for making my foundations in business management so solid that I could realise my dream this early in life."

Nadia Saeed is another graduate from this new degree. She is staying much closer to home - as Project Manager in the WBS Academic Services team. She started at the beginning of January and will be working on a range of projects in the areas of management information production; MIS data mapping to SITS (the students records system); module and mark entry reconciliation and facilities data management.

Nine doctoral graduands celebrating included Alex Wilson, son of WBS Acting Dean, David Wilson, and among the MBAs celebrating was Emma Cooper, whose husband Ian was among the very first undergraduate Engineering cohort to graduate from the University in the 1960s.

Friday saw Deputy Dean Simon Collinson presenting diplomas to a combined total of 82 graduates of the Postgraduate Diploma in Local Government Management and the Postgraduate Diploma in Public Finance and Leadership, again held in the Rootes building on campus. In total 235 people attended. Special awards were presented to James Gould, Caroline Little, Brian Roberts, Gareth Young, and Claire Glavina for the Local Government Management Diploma by Sara Williams, Strategic Advisor for the Improvement and Development Agency for Local Government who sponsor this programme, and to Alistair Bridges for the Public Finance and Leadership Diploma by Adrian Pulham, Director of Education and Training at CIPFA, who partner WBS on this programme.

Congratulations to all!

WBS staff and students can view reportage-style photos on WBS' Flickr page via the link below.

See more:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wbs-ac-uk/sets/72157623295361434/