Asian Business School Briefing: August 10 2015

NUS Business School remembers its '21 brave souls'

Yesterday, August 9, Singapore celebrated 50 years since becoming an independent republic in 1965. The year 1965 also saw the establishment of the forerunner to NUS Business School, the Department of Business Administration at the University of Singapore – with a faculty of just four.

Students were a little harder to come by back then and NUS Business School’s first class are affectionately referred to as the ‘21 brave souls’ – one of whom told the Straits Times that: “Those of us who signed up were people with a sense of adventure, people who had the courage to try something different.”

Nowadays, of course, the school’s place in Singapore’s educational landscape seems secure and NUS Business School’s dean of the past seven years, Bernard Yeung, believes that through a continual emphasis on teaching that reflects the nature of business in Asia his institution has “matured to the point that we can call the shots on what a leading business school is.” The school will hold a 50th anniversary celebration of its own early next month, for those who have passed through its corridors over the last half century.

Financial literacy promoted by Singapore Management University

Elsewhere, Singapore Management University (SMU) paid tribute to the city state’s 50th birthday by holding a public event on financial literacy back in June.

The Financial Literacy Fiesta, co-organized with Citi Singapore, featured an exhibition charting the evolution of Singapore’s currency since 1965, designed by students at SMU.

Since 2012, Singapore Management University - home to the Lee Kong Chian School of Business - has worked with Citi on a program in which students are trained to introduce and teach financial literacy concepts to young adults.  

Indian School of Business names marketing professor as its next dean

Singapore Management University is also the institution from which the Indian School of Business (ISB) has plucked its next dean.

Marketing professor and deputy president of academic affairs at SMU, Rajendra Srivastava, will take over from Ajit Rangnekar at ISB at the start of next year, 2016.

Srivastava’s plans center on carving out an international reputation for the school in matters relating to emerging markets – starting with India and the rest of Asia, according to an announcement for the Indian School of Business.

Before joining SMU in 2008, Srivastava held positions at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and the University of Texas at Austin, where he helped establish research institutes in marketing and customer insights, respectively.  

The Indian School of Business is one of four business schools in India to feature in the latest QS Global 200 Business Schools Report, and the only one that is not an IIM (Indian Institute of Management).