• National Intercollegiate Business Ethics Competition - 1st place
• PolyHouse - Receives Media Attention
• Bank of America Low-Income Housing Challenge - 1st Place
• International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition

1st place in the National Intercollegiate Business Ethics Competition!!!

Pictured from left to right: Judges: Stanley Botts - Verizon, Kevin Harrington - Kimberly-Clark, Scott Delanty - Computer Sciences Corporation. Team members: Jessica Valpey - MBA, Sean Martin - MBA, Adrienne Lindsay - MBA, James Erickson - MS I&TS.

A team of four Orfalea College of Business graduate students won the overall prize for the annual event hosted by Loyola Marymount University's Center for Ethics and Business. The competition, involving prominent schools (Loyola Marymount, New York University, Texas A&M, University of Southern California, University of Washington, Villanova, Cal Poly and the US Naval Academy), is designed to help students see that it is possible to be both ethical and profitable in business at the same time. The Cal Poly team won for their case and presentation on stealth marketing, a deceptive form of guerilla marketing.

The heart of the Business Ethics Competition is a student team case/presentation.
Each team, acting as a consulting company, prepares a presentation to explain the legal, financial and ethical dimensions of a selected problem. (The range of possible topics is virtually infinite and can relate to any area of business) Teams recommend a solution that must address all three topic areas. Not surprisingly, even though all three topic areas must be addressed, judges place special weight on the strength of the ethical analysis of the problem and the ethical acceptability of the solution. The ethical character of analyses and recommendations are evaluated from the perspective of "philosophical ethics." That is, judges look for discussion of at least: the amount and type of tangible good and harm involved; and the intrinsic character of the actions involved.

POLYHOUSE - Extreme Makeover the Cal Poly Way!

The media supplied much deserved recognition for the "extreme makeover", performed as part of the PolyHouse Project. Professor Roya Javadpour lead Engineering Managment, Industrial & Manufacturing Engineering, and Industrial and Technical Studies graduate students through the intense technological project management class (IME 556). The result, a fantastic "Learn-by-Doing" experience that benefitted one local family.

Information about the course, project and clips of the media coverage can be found at www.polyhouse.org

Bank of America Low-Income Housing Challenge

The competition, involving several prominent West Coast graduate schools (UC Berkeley, U C Davis, Cal Poly and Stanford), required that each university partner with community organizations and developers to identify a viable site and develop a proposal that includes and addresses design, finance, market and community support elements.

3rd place in the International Collegiate Business Strategy Competion

A team of seven MBA students from the Orfalea College of Business represented Cal Poly at the 42st Annual International Collegiate Business Strategy Competition held in April in San Diego, California.

In addition to making a broad range of business and ethical decisions, students were also required to complete a comprehensive business plan, annual report, and several other management reports reflecting goal attainment and strategy changes.