RESEARCH FOR THE COMMON GOOD

CULTIVATING CRITICAL THINKING IN FINANCE Research for the Common Good

PAUL KIM, BOB MELLMAN, AND HANK NGUYEN

Paul Kim, Bob Mellman, and Hank Nguyen are in high demand at the Colin Powell School. As adjunct professors and, in Mellman’s case, a volunteer mentor, these members of the Economics and Business Department are teaching their students to think critically about finance. All three finished successful careers on Wall Street and now devote themselves to preparing the next generation of Colin Powell School students.

Kim, who is the most recent addition to the trio, joined the Colin Powell School in 2018. After spending many years on Wall Street in investment management and global technology, he decided to turn his attention simultaneously to managing several companies and investment platforms and to using his investment skills in support of teaching the next generation about how to successfully build careers in the financial sector. His arrival at CCNY heralded an exciting addition to the adjunct faculty on several levels, as his leadership abilities and investment acumen are channeling new options for Colin Powell School students into finance career opportunities.

Currently co-teaching some of Nguyen’s classes, Kim orchestrated two events in 2018-19 for “EcoBiz” students that offered them unique, first-hand experiences with top businesses. The first was for a financial economics class that was analyzing the securities of individual companies. On one occasion, the company in question was Tesla. Kim came up with the idea of giving the class hands-on knowledge of These amazing members of the Economics and Business Department are teaching their students to think about and analyze problems, projects, theories from an applied perspective; to think of the “why” and “how” of how things work. All three have left successful careers on Wall Street by choice and are keen to give back to CCNY students from their experiences.

what an investment analysis discussion looks like. He knew a senior investor relations officer at the company who in turn suggested including one of their biggest investors. Kim set up a private discussion event at Tesla’s office in New York City. He moderated the discussion and the students came away with knowledge they would never have been able to glean otherwise.

The other event involved the Finance Capstone Class in spring 2019, the second fireside chat of the spring semester, which offered the entire

CCNY community the opportunity to attend a talk between CCNY President Vince Boudreau and Estee Lauder Executive VP and CFO Tracey T. Travis. Ms. Travis brought 20 Estee Lauder staff with her to offer career and leadership insights, including a discussion of how mentorship and sponsorship can be viewed as complementary processes in one’s career. As an African American woman at the top level of American business, Travis was able to offer insights to the diverse group of students in attendance about how to find opportunities for themselves in the hierarchy of work. She later invited a group of Kim’s and Nguyen’s students to the Estee Lauder headquarters to meet with the senior person in charge of investor relations for Tom Ford Beauty, a division of Estee Lauder. As a result, several CPS students had internships with the company for the summer. Hank Nguyen has been at the Colin Powell School since 2015 when he took over Professor Maria-Christina Binz-Scharf ’s Economics and Business classes during her sabbatical. He had retired from his position as head of quantitative trading at Jeffries, where he focused on special situations and risk arbitrage. From the very first class, his goal was to change how students think about rational decisionmaking. He challenges his students to learn and absorb a deep knowledge of the financial marketplace. Nguyen is influenced by Howard Marks’ Second Level Thinking, the art of thinking in a unique and better way than the usual first level of analysis that is more common. He is a dynamic teacher who constantly tells his students to ask “Where,” “Why,” and “How” all things function and to question the authority of theories alone to prove validation. He urges students to question everything and learn how to think for themselves and encourages them to be open to real world experiences and critical thinking processes. Bob Mellman is the third practitioner turned advisor, tutor, and mentor to many students, both in EcoBiz and other disciplines within the Colin Powell School. He spent 32 years as

an economist at J.P. Morgan Chase. After Mellman retired, he was ready for a whole new career as a support person who can bridge the distance between his advisees’ knowledge of their coursework and the tools they may need to move forward to a place of success. Several students recently came to him with D’s on a midterm. Once he was convinced that they were willing to work hard, he gave them his all and they each passed the final with an A. Mellman says that tutoring is only part of what he does with his students. He frequently prepares students for interviews for internships

by demystifying what goes on in investment banks. He reaches many students who don’t feel entitled to opportunity by encouraging them to believe that they can be effective in their studies and their careers by learning the language of their work environment and knowing their own abilities. He says he feels that this is crucial for many students because success in a first job can mean the difference between a good experience in any future work and years of struggle.

Research for the Common Good

POLITICS OF THE MIDDLE EAST

DIANA B. GREENWALD JOINS THE POLITICAL SCIENCE DEPARTMENT

Her teaching experience has been a great reminder of why one’s work as a researcher is so important and relevant. Greenwald praises the Colin Powell School for its diversity. She is more convinced than ever that her career choices have led her to an “unparalleled world-class institution.

When Assistant Professor of Political Science Diana B. Greenwald started graduate school at the University of Michigan, she planned to focus her studies on the politics of the Middle East. But she had concluded that the conflict between Israel and Palestine was too contentious. Then the Arab Spring happened and suddenly Syria, Egypt, and much of the Middle East were in turmoil. The Palestinian Territories, while still a site of longstanding conflict and occupation, suddenly seemed like a relatively hospitable area for investigation.

Before she knew it, she was hooked. She completed her Ph.D. dissertation, “Pathways to Self-Rule: Occupation, Resistance and State-Building in Palestine and Timor-Leste,” in 2017. She then postponed her start at CCNY for a year to accept a position as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Middle East Initiative at the Harvard Kennedy School (2017-2018).

Greenwald is currently completing a book project, Policing, Taxing, and Spending Without a State: The Origins and Effects of Partial Self-Rule in Palestine, which is derived from her dissertation. She examines local institutions in the Palestinian Territories between 2005 and 2012, just after the second Intifada. The book explores issues of policing, taxation, and public service provision, three of the basic functions of a state. In a separate research project, she is examining the ways that generational differences within the Palestinian population can affect public attitudes toward conflict and political institutions.

Now settling in to her teaching career at CCNY, Greenwald describes her first year at the Colin Powell School as “fantastic. I taught three classes: Middle East Politics and Government, Political Economy and Development, and Introduction to World Politics and have found my students to be particularly intellectually curious about world politics and anxious to sort out if they want to go in this direction in their studies, with international law, foreign policy, or perhaps international humanitarian work.” A number of her students are themselves immigrants from the Middle East or trace their family’s roots to the region, and those that don’t tend to find valuable connections to their own backgrounds and experiences. She says her teaching experience has been a great reminder of why one’s work as a researcher is so important and relevant. Greenwald praises the school for its diversity. She is more convinced than ever that her career choices have led her to an “unparalleled world-class institution.”

HARLEM OPIOID CRISIS

CROSS COMMINUTY RESEARCH, EDUCATION, AND TREATMENT INITIATIVES

Across the country, the opioid crisis is killing young people. In Harlem, it is disproportionately affecting African Americans in their mid-50s and older. The contrast in how the epidemic is affecting our community as compared with the nation has led a team of Colin Powell School and CCNY researchers to partner with President Vince Boudreau and Lloyd Williams, President of The Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce, to plan the Opioid Crisis Research, Education, and Treatment Initiative. In Harlem, drug users are being exposed to synthetic drugs such as Fentanyl, an often deadly outcome for anyone who comes in contact with it. In the rest of the country, the epidemic has been primarily caused by overprescribed and overused prescription drugs to ease the pain of surgery and injury.

Three-Part Opioid Crisis Summits

Three Opioid Crisis Summits were organized to explore opportunities for greater synergy of purpose between CCNY and the Harlem Chamber of Commerce, along with other stakeholders to assist the community in saving lives and controlling this dreadful epidemic. The first meeting was on April 17, 2019 at CCNY and included 30 stakeholders. Faculty representatives from the Colin Powell School included Dr. Robert Melara, chair of the Psychology Department at CCNY and his team of Associate Professor Nancy Sohler, from the CUNY Medical School, Assistant Psychology Professor Teresa Lopez-Castro, who specializes in research on substance abuse and trauma, and Anthropology Department Chair and Associate Professor Lotti Silber, who examines medical records. The discussion focused on how community organizations might work more effectively together. At the next meeting, on May 15, 2019, approximately sixty people gathered at Columbia University’s Manhattanville Campus. As the meetings grew in attendance, the discussion moved beyond trying to educate those present about the crisis to expanding the group to other interested stakeholders and to considering what resources are needed to coordinate, educate, train, and medically assist the community.

Funds Needed to Conduct Research

Dr. Robert Melara is coordinating faculty member for CCNY’s group with Lopez Castro and Silber. They, along with everyone else connected to the project are working voluntarily. Dr. Sohler mobilized medical students from CUNY School of Medicine to receive training in administering Narcan, the antidote to overdosing on heroin or Fentanyl. In addition, the NYC Department of Health came to

the CCNY campus several times to train students in administering Narcan and provided free kits. Drs. Melara and Sohlar recently visited the Elev8 Wellness Center and saw firsthand how a large number of people going through the rehabilitation process ultimately leave and go back out on the streets. Lee Weiss, the director of the Center requested the CCNY group Leslie Paik joined the Colin Powell School’s Sociology faculty in 2006 and has been teaching courses on social problems, law and society, deviance, and juvenile justice since then. Before graduate school, she worked at the Center for Court Innovation, planning and researching justice reform projects with a particular focus on youth and neighborhoods. Paik is currently working on a book, Trapped in The Maze: Family MultiInstitutional Involvement, Poverty and Inequality, based on her ethnographic research and interviews with families –30 from Staten Island with members involved in the juvenile court system, and 33 from the Bronx with adolescents involved with the health system for a chronic illness (e.g., asthma, diabetes, obesity). The book examines the multidimensional inequality that each family faces. Most of her subjects are poor people of color. She examines the complex ways that the court, welfare, and education systems work together to control much of their lives. Paik’s research indicates that when “maze walls” rise higher for various (and often unpredictable) reasons, the challenge to get over them becomes almost insurmountable. start a research project to track alumni of rehab to see what is happening to them once they are back on the streets. They need funds to hire a team of CCNY researchers and students to do this work, as well as for other research that is needed to study this intractable problem. As the initiative continues, more researchers and community leaders will be involved, including at For Fall 2019, Paik has been awarded an Advanced Research Collaborative Fellowship by the CUNY Graduate Center to finish writing her book. She has a contract for the book with the University of California Press and an expected publication date of 2021. Moving The Conversation Forward Along with writing her book, for the past few years, Paik has been working with the Juvenile Law Center, the first non-profit, public interest law firm for children in the country, to assist their advocacy efforts regarding the abolition of fines and fees charged to juveniles caught up in the justice system. Paik’s research focuses on two specific planned events in the second half of 2019. All involved share the desire to work together toward solutions, such as supportive housing for homeless people after treatment. CCNY President Boudreau has vowed to continue providing the academic and research resources of the College to study and assist the community in addressing the crisis.

SCHOLAR/ADVOCATE FOR JUVENILE JUSTICE REFORM

SOCIOLOGIST LESLIE PAIK jurisdictions where the Juvenile Law Center is active: Madison, Wisconsin, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. So far, she has interviewed 20 families (both youths and parents) and 10 victims in Madison (51 people in all) to come up with viable alternatives to families going into poverty by paying the fines and/or fees that often are not going to the victims of the crime.

The Rewards of Teaching at CCNY

Paik readily speaks of the great reward she receives from teaching at the Colin Powell School, namely the “joy and privilege of teaching the students.” She speaks of the structural constraints and institutional racism that many CCNY students have suffered prior to coming to college. Paik makes clear to her students that their situations and struggles to achieve social mobility, sometimes as the first in their families to go to college, are not their fault, but the result of societal values misplaced on wealth, social status, and skin color. She works to show CCNY students that they have a safe and secure place in her classroom to achieve their educational goals and to learn about the importance of collective mobilization and social justice to help their families, communities, and society more broadly.