Schools Prepare For Next Downturn
在今年夏季的课堂上，杰里提(Kevin Gerrity)的商学院教授要求他进行角色扮演：如果他是一家银行的首席执行长，他会如何应对本轮金融危机？Columbia Business School哥伦比亚大学商学院这个练习是前雷曼兄弟(Lehman Brothers)一名管理人员在哥伦比亚大学商学院讲授的两个月课程的一部分，也是学校更广泛举措的组成部分。由于身处纽约金融危机的中心，以及约一半的毕业生通常都进入了金融领域，哥伦比亚大学对帮助学生了解这场危机及其后果有着特殊的兴趣。其中一个举措是，一位金融学教授本月将向所有全日制新生提供一个入学培训，讲述他们的每门核心课程与这场危机的关系是怎样的。课程委员会正在研究如何将这次危机的经验教训加入到教学中。有六名教授将通过一门新课从多个角度分析这场危机。贯穿始终的主要教学内容是：在下一轮经济危机时，如何凭借有限的信息做出明智的决定，从多个角度检查问题，并预测可能发生的事情。哥伦比亚大学商学院副院长会计学教授吉夫(Amir Ziv)说，我们认为这场危机带来的非常重要的事情之一是把这一切给学生们贯穿了起来。我们的目标是让学生对未来的危机中会发生什么做好准备。在入学培训上，金融学教授姜纬将用90分钟的时间向大约500名入学新生讲述了他们的核心课程将如何通过评估风险的方法帮助分析这场危机，评价股价与价值之差，以及凭借有限的信息做出艰难的选择。她说，向学生展示如何在不确定环境下做出决定非常重要。在明年春季的学期里，哥伦比亚大学将首次推出一门由来自金融经济管理和风险管理领域的教授讲授的一门“综合性”课程。学生将分析危机中发生的事件，并展望金融业的未来；他们将讨论新的监管规定等方面的改变会给这个行业带来何种变化。使用六名教授是有意为之。吉夫说，这门课程应该传达从多个角度研究问题的重要性。他说，金融专业人员更为综合性的办法可能有助于缓和危机。他说，所有的迹象都在那里。只是人们都忙着左右顾盼了。通过让各个学科的教师们走到一起，互相交流……这将向学生们展示如何从更高的层次思考问题。28岁的杰里提在进入商学院前是一名房地产分析师。他说，他对监管漏洞和金融机构的风险偏好等问题对这场危机的影响已经有了更好的理解。他的老师拉索(Thomas Russo)曾任雷曼兄弟首席法律事务长，目前在Patton Boggs LLP律师事务所任职。他让学生们分别扮演首席执行长财政部长记者和学者，分析及讨论奖金发放等金融危机中的问题。杰里提说，重点是我们从这里能走向哪里。他说，这让他考虑作为金融专业人员，他的职责应该是什么。我真的需要思考我将做出的选择。Diana Middleton / Jane Porter
In class this summer, Kevin Gerrity's business-school professor asked him to role-play: If he were a bank CEO, how would he have responded to the financial crisis?The exercise was part of a two-month course at Columbia Business School taught by a former Lehman Brothers executive, and part of a broader effort on campus. At the epicenter of the financial meltdown in New York -- and with about half its graduates typically landing in finance -- Columbia has a special interest in helping students understand the crisis and its consequences.On tap: A finance professor will deliver an orientation lecture this month to all incoming full-time students about how each of their core courses relates to the crisis. A curriculum committee is studying how to integrate lessons from the crisis into classes. One new class will analyze the crisis from multiple perspectives, via six professors.Key lessons throughout: how to make smart decisions with limited information, examine problems from more than one angle and anticipate what might happen in the next economic blowup.'One of the things we saw that's very important with this crisis is connecting the dots for students,' says Amir Ziv, vice dean and accounting professor at Columbia. 'Our goal is to prepare students for what will happen in the next crisis.'At orientation, finance professor Wei Jiang will speak for 90 minutes to roughly 500 incoming students about how lessons from their core courses can help analyze the meltdown, with ways to assess risk, evaluate gaps between share price and value, and make tough calls with limited information. 'It's very important that we show students how to make decisions under uncertainty,' Ms. Jiang says.This spring, Columbia will debut an 'integrated' class taught by six professors from finance, economics, management and risk management. Students will analyze what happened in the crisis and look at the future of the finance industry; they'll discuss how changes like new regulations might alter the business.The use of six professors is deliberate. Mr. Ziv says the class should convey the importance of studying a problem from multiple angles. A more-integrated approach among finance professionals might have helped temper the crisis, he says. 'All the signs were there. It's just that people were too busy looking to the right and left,' he says. 'By bringing faculty in from all these disciplines and having them interact with each other . . . that will demonstrate to students how to think about things from a higher level.'Mr. Gerrity, 28 years old, a real-estate analyst before business school, says he already has a better understanding of how things like regulatory gaps and an appetite for risk at finance firms contributed to the crisis.His teacher, Thomas Russo, a former Lehman Brothers chief legal officer who is now at law firm Patton Boggs LLP, had students role play as CEO, treasury secretary, journalist and academic to analyze and debate a crisis issue, such as bonus pay.'The focus was where we can go from here,' says Mr. Gerrity. It made him examine 'what my responsibility would be as a financial professional,' he says. 'I really had to think about the choices I am going to make.'Diana Middleton / Jane Porter
In class this summer, Kevin Gerrity's business-school professor asked him to role-play: If he were a bank CEO, how would he have responded to the financial crisis?The exercise was part of a two-month course at Columbia Business School taught by a former Lehman Brothers executive, and part of a broader effort on campus. At the epicenter of the financial meltdown in New York -- and with about half its graduates typically landing in finance -- Columbia has a special interest in helping students understand the crisis and its consequences.On tap: A finance professor will deliver an orientation lecture this month to all incoming full-time students about how each of their core courses relates to the crisis. A curriculum committee is studying how to integrate lessons from the crisis into classes. One new class will analyze the crisis from multiple perspectives, via six professors.Key lessons throughout: how to make smart decisions with limited information, examine problems from more than one angle and anticipate what might happen in the next economic blowup.'One of the things we saw that's very important with this crisis is connecting the dots for students,' says Amir Ziv, vice dean and accounting professor at Columbia. 'Our goal is to prepare students for what will happen in the next crisis.'At orientation, finance professor Wei Jiang will speak for 90 minutes to roughly 500 incoming students about how lessons from their core courses can help analyze the meltdown, with ways to assess risk, evaluate gaps between share price and value, and make tough calls with limited information. 'It's very important that we show students how to make decisions under uncertainty,' Ms. Jiang says.This spring, Columbia will debut an 'integrated' class taught by six professors from finance, economics, management and risk management. Students will analyze what happened in the crisis and look at the future of the finance industry; they'll discuss how changes like new regulations might alter the business.The use of six professors is deliberate. Mr. Ziv says the class should convey the importance of studying a problem from multiple angles. A more-integrated approach among finance professionals might have helped temper the crisis, he says. 'All the signs were there. It's just that people were too busy looking to the right and left,' he says. 'By bringing faculty in from all these disciplines and having them interact with each other . . . that will demonstrate to students how to think about things from a higher level.'Mr. Gerrity, 28 years old, a real-estate analyst before business school, says he already has a better understanding of how things like regulatory gaps and an appetite for risk at finance firms contributed to the crisis.His teacher, Thomas Russo, a former Lehman Brothers chief legal officer who is now at law firm Patton Boggs LLP, had students role play as CEO, treasury secretary, journalist and academic to analyze and debate a crisis issue, such as bonus pay.'The focus was where we can go from here,' says Mr. Gerrity. It made him examine 'what my responsibility would be as a financial professional,' he says. 'I really had to think about the choices I am going to make.'Diana Middleton / Jane Porter