Gifts from Ford Fund and Lear help establish student finance lab

Thanks to generous contributions from the Ford Motor Company Fund and Lear Corporation, the Wayne State University School of Business is proud to announce the establishment of a new student finance lab.

Located in the Prentis Building on WSU’s main campus in Midtown Detroit, the facility will provide students with hands-on experience with many of the same tools and technologies they would use in a professional setting, including Bloomberg terminals and a real-time LED stock ticker.

According to Sudip Datta, T. Norris Hitchman Endowed Chair and chair of the Department of Finance in the WSU School of Business, the availability of Bloomberg resources, in particular, provides a wealth of new opportunities for WSU students and faculty alike.

“On behalf of all Wayne State business students, especially our finance majors, I am very grateful to the Ford Fund and Lear for their donations to get this finance lab off the ground,” Datta said. “This enables our finance students to compete on a level playing field with their counterparts in other schools in the area and around the world.”

Ford and Lear each made contributions of $50,000 to the project.

According to WSU School of Business Dean Robert Forsythe, the new finance lab, in conjunction with a student managed investment fund that was established earlier this year thanks to a $100,000 gift from Fifth Third Bank, will substantially enhance the marketability and placement of all WSU business students, not just finance majors.

“While these new resources will allow us to enhance our coursework and experiential learning opportunities in finance, in particular, these types of contributions from our major corporate partners and employers also enhance the value of all Wayne State business degrees,” Forsythe said. “We thank partners like Fifth Third, Ford Fund and Lear for their continued support.”

The gifts from the Lear Corporation, Ford Motor Company Fund and Fifth Third Bank are part of Wayne State University’s $750 million Pivotal Moments fundraising campaign, which had its public launch in October 2014.

 

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