Always one of my favorite interviews, not just an incredible interview with two awesome guests, but just coming off the bell podium.
Please say hello to Larisa Genin.
She is the Dean of Wichita State University's Barton School of Business and Ellie Stringer, a student at the aforementioned Barton School.
Great to have both of you here and congratulations.
Thank you.
Larissa, let me kick things off with you.
You're here to celebrate 100 years of business excellence at Wichita State University.
What does this moment being here at the New York Stock Exchange mean about the school's presence on a national stage?
Well, we're honored to be here representing Wichita State University, and that's the only public urban research university.
We're based in Wichita, Kansas. and we are celebrating a hundred years of uh... business excellence as part of the barton school of business and we're grateful to our university for all the support inspiration and guidance and i must say we're known for student-centered innovation driven focus and uh... we just unveiled our president rick muma's book uh... student-centered innovation driven and the transformation that we've gone through so the last hundred years look very remarkable, the next 100 years are gonna be spectacular.
Oh, that's really cool, and thanks for bringing the book.
Ella, I gotta ask you about your students' perspective, not just what it's like to be here at the Stock Exchange, but why did you choose Spartan in terms of your education, and in what ways do you most feel it's different?
How is it separate from more of a traditional business program?
Absolutely.
I love being a student at Wichita State University, especially, you know, in the Barton School of Business.
My favorite applied learning aspect has really been our Cummings Student Managed Investment Fund.
There are many investment funds across the nation, but I feel like what we really do different is create that more student-centered aspect.
It's not faculty-run.
All of the power of decision-making is in the student hands, and I really think that's been helping us learn.
Could you talk to us a little bit about your curriculum?
Because those of us that cover financial media every day, at some point we've learned this stuff.
But what does a modern curriculum for the Barton School of Business actually look like for a student like yourself?
Yeah, absolutely.
I think a really important aspect of our curriculum is our business core.
For the first couple years of our business degrees, we have to take a number of different subjects, kind of spanning our entire offering of majors.
So it kind of gives you a good sense of what you want to do actually, instead of what you think you want to do going into college.
That's awesome.
And Dr.
Jenin, WSU is known for applied learning, like Ellie just said.
How does that actually translate into real life outcomes for your students?
Well, Wichita State University is the leader in applied learning, and we have over 12,000, close to 13,000 applied learning experiences that our students have gone through, and they earned close to $40 million.
So we are really all about access, affordability, and creating opportunities for students beyond the classroom, and really unlocking their potential and setting them for meaningful careers and focusing on contributing to Wichita's economic prosperity and creating the talent pipeline.
That's amazing.
Larissa Jenning, congratulations.
Thank you.
Ali Stringer, huge congratulations to you.
When you graduate, please come back and see us down here on the train floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Really nice to have both of you.
