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 James Garven:The Frank S. Groner Memorial Chair of Finance, Professor of Finance and Insurance, and Director of the Risk Management and Insurance program at Baylor's Hankamer School of Business
As an undergraduate, James Garven transcribed jazz musician John Coltrane's challenging saxophone solo, "Giant Steps." "I slowed [the recording] down so that I could figure out what he was playing. All I cared about was I wanted to sound like John Coltrane," says Garven, who practiced his instrument five to six hours a day.
Taking on giant problems, and the steps necessary to decode them, has been Garven's modus operandi ever since. He attributes his out-of-the-box thinking to his early college days majoring in saxophone performance. "I feel like there are aspects of what I learned as a musician that helped me every day in everything I do," he says.
"The most important thing in undergraduate education is to be able to think creatively and rigorously," he says. "I hope that my class helps students with that. I feel like my class could be useful to anyone and not just business students." A big-picture thinker, Garven seeks to give his students these basics and then teach their application in the financial and business worlds.
Garven, who came to Baylor in 2000, earned a master's degree in business administration at Illinois State University and a doctorate in finance at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He constantly updates his research and class material by attending and organizing conferences such as the World Risk and Insurance Economics Congress he oversaw in August in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Teaching students to be creative thinkers requires an active research agenda, says Garven, who focuses on topics related to corporate risk management, insurance economics and option pricing theory and applications. "You have to be engaged in the world, being on editorial boards, reviewing papers, going to conferences, seeing what people are up to," he says. He is associate editor of Geneva Risk and Insurance Review and the Journal of Risk and Insurance, an award-winning author and president-elect of the American Risk and Insurance Association.
Garven often brings current events such as terrorism and individual risk management into his classroom discussions.
"I'm never happy with where my course is because there's always something new I can incorporate or new ways I can present ideas, and that is a direct result of scholarship."
He also uses the latest technology to engage his students with world events. He started a weblog, or "blog," on risk management and finance in summer 2004. "Blogging helps me put together formative ideas," he says. "You learn better when you have to teach and explain to somebody." He often ties class content and research projects into his blog, which is available at http://www.finweb.com.
The attitude toward service that Baylor professors have is unique, Garven says. His older son, Chad, recently graduated from the University with a bachelor of fine arts degree in graphic design, and his younger son, Erik, is earning a degree in business. "I think the students get a better deal here," Garven says. "We [Baylor professors] exist to serve students."
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