OR/MS Today - August 2002 - Inside Story

<BODY bgcolor="#ffffff" link="cc0000" vlink="cc0000" text="#000000"> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=4 border=0><br>   <table border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 width=480><tr valign=top> <td width=10><img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 hspace=4 border=0></td> <td width=470> <FONT face="verdana, arial, helvetica" SIZE=2><B><I><A HREF="../../ORMS.shtml" TARGET="_top">OR/MS Today</A> - August 2002</I></B></font><BR> <hr size="1"> <img src="cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=4 border=0><br> <font face="times new roman, times"> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=4 border=0><br> <FONT face="verdana, arial, helvetica" SIZE=2><B>Inside Story</B></FONT><br> <IMG SRC="../barbluehook.gif" WIDTH="468" HEIGHT="4"><br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=8 border=0><br> <FONT SIZE="+2"><B>A Passion for Education</B></FONT><BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> <FONT face="verdana, arial, helvetica" SIZE=2><B>Peter Horner, editor<BR <A HREF="mailto:horner@lionhrtpub.com">horner@lionhrtpub.com</A></B></FONT><br> <hr size="1"> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=12 border=0><br>    Robert Nydick of Villanova University and the author of this month's Issues in Education column hits the nail on the head when he points to "passion" as the common denominator in successful teaching ("<A HREF="freducation.html" TARGET="_top">Passion and Fun in the Classroom</A>," page 14). You may know your X's and O's forwards and backwards, but if you can't motivate and inspire the troops, you're not going to win their hearts ... or their minds.<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> When this back-to-school special issue was taking shape, I sent out a memo to all of our regular columnists inviting them to direct their comments to the education theme which I facetiously summed up as "How to Teach OR/MS to MBAs Without Really Trying." One of our columnists shot back, "You can't teach OR/MS to MBAs without really trying. You can barely do it with your best all-out effort. They're trained to resist anything they can't grasp immediately from a set of PowerPoint slides."<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> The columnist is right, of course. Business students are wired differently than, say, engineers. MBAs don't want you to show them the math, they just want you to show them the money ... or how they can make it. We're talking generalities here, but I don't think too many professors charged with teaching management science in a business school would deny that they face one heck of a challenge  from the dean (who might question the added value of a "technical and quantitative" course) all the way down to the students (whose heads begin to spin the minute they see an equation).<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> As Salwa Ammar and Ronald Wright note in their Forum piece ("<A HREF="frforum.html" TARGET="_top">Where's the Beef?</A>" page 24), "OR/MS educators may already be an endangered species in undergraduate business programs." They surveyed 163 institutions to ascertain the status of OR/MS courses in undergraduate business curricula. Their results are alarming.<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> Yet, despite the obvious obstacles, management science flourishes at certain business schools. At the Amos Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, Steve Powell has made it his mission to turn out MBAs well-armed with modeling skills. His students routinely go on to enjoy successful careers in business, and many of them credit Powell's management science course for giving them an edge in the real world. Powell, who was awarded the INFORMS Prize for the Teaching of OR/MS Practice last year, shares his insights on teaching the MBA management science course in this special issue ("<A HREF="frpowell.html" TARGET="_top">Defining Success</A>," page 30). So how does one measure the success of such a course? Powell suggests we look beyond the classroom and focus on the bottom line. Now that's a concept any MBA can appreciate.<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> Professors Erhan Erkut and Armann Ingolfsson of the University of Alberta School of Business have achieved what many thought was impossible: make management science "one of the most popular and respected areas in the business school." The numbers don't lie: enrollment in the biz school's elective MS courses climbed from 45 to 600 in four years. To find out how they managed to put management science on the map, see "<A HREF="frerkut.html" TARGET="_top">Managing the Student Supply Chain</A>" (page 36).<BR> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=6 border=0><br> I think you will agree that our contributing authors demonstrate extraordinary passion for their favorite subject: education.<br>  <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=5 border=0><br>  <img src="../barblue.gif" width=468 height=1 border=0 alt=" "><br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=8 border=0><br> <font face="verdana, arial, helvetica" size="1"> <CENTER><script type="text/javascript"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js"> </script></CENTER><br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=8 border=0><br> <LI> <A HREF="tocfr.html" Target="_top"><I>Table of Contents</I></A><br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=4 border=0><br> <LI> <A HREF="../../ORMS.shtml" TARGET="_top"><I>OR/MS Today</I> Home Page</A><br>  <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=8 border=0><br> <img src="../barblue.gif" width=468 height=1 border=0 alt=" "><br> <b><i>OR/MS Today</i></b> copyright © 2002 by <A HREF="http://www.informs.org/" target="_new">the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences</a>. All rights reserved.<br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=3 border=0><br> <img src="../bargrey.gif" width=468 height=1 border=0 alt=" "><br> <b>Lionheart Publishing, Inc.</b><br> 506 Roswell Street, Suite 220, Marietta, GA 30060 USA<br> Phone: 770-431-0867 | Fax: 770-432-6969<br> E-mail: <a href="mailto:lpi@lionhrtpub.com">lpi@lionhrtpub.com</a><br> URL: <A HREF="http://www.lionhrtpub.com" target="_top">http://www.lionhrtpub.com</A><br> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=3 border=0><br> <img src="../bargrey.gif" width=468 height=1 border=0 alt=" "><br> Web Site © Copyright 2002 by Lionheart Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. </td></tr></table> <img src="../cleardot.gif" width=1 height=1 vspace=2 border=0><br> </BODY>