Eleven new full-time faculty joined the UNL College of Business Administration this fall. The additions are an integral part of Dean Donde Plowman’s goal to increase attendance at CBA over the next five years.

Dr. Jenna Pieper, assistant professor of management (human resources)

• Pieper, originally from Harvard, Neb., came to CBA from the University of Texas at Dallas after receiving her Ph.D. from fellow Big Ten member institution, University of Wisconsin-Madison. She recently received the 2012 Ralph Alexander Best Dissertation in Human Resource Management Award given by the Human Resource Division of the Academy of Management. Pieper’s research interests include strategic human resource management and workplace diversity.
   


• Dr. Christopher Tuggle, assistant professor of management (strategy)
  
  

  Dr. Christopher Tuggle

  Tuggle taught at the Trulaske College of Business at the University of Missouri the past seven years. He received his Ph.D. in business administration with emphases in strategic management and entrepreneurship in 2004 from Texas A & M University. Tuggle spent one year on a postdoctoral fellowship at the Mays Business School at Texas A & M. He received the Richard G. Miller Summer Scholar Award for summer 2010-2014.
   


• Dr. Laurie Miller, assistant professor of practice in economics
  
  

  Dr. Laurie Miller

  Miller received her Ph.D. earlier this year from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She taught economics in the University of Wisconsin system for over five years before joining CBA as an assistant professor of practice in economics.
   


• Dr. Jifeng Yu, assistant professor of management (strategy)
  
  

  Dr. Jifeng Yu

  Yu joined the CBA department of management after spending the past six years teaching at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He received his Ph.D. from Georgia State University where he won multiple honors including the Waino W. Suojanen Research Excellence Award and the GTA Teaching Excellence Award.
   


• Dr. Elina Ibrayeva, assistant professor of practice in management
  
  

  Dr. Elina Ibrayeva

  Ibrayeva earned a Ph.D. in management from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1999. Her academic areas of concentration are International Organizational Behavior, Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship. Ibrayeva has been teaching graduate and undergraduate classes at Southwest Minnesota State University for the past 12 years.

• Steve Welton, assistant professor of practice in marketing
  
  

  Steve Welton

  Welton has expertise in all aspects of financial services marketing. He earned his MBA from Rockhurst University and worked at Ameritas Life Insurance Corporation for seven years, most recently holding the position of vice president of strategic marketing. He began teaching courses at CBA in 2011.
   


• Jean Riley-Schultz, assistant professor of practice in accounting
  
  

  Jean Riley-Schultz

  Riley-Schultz has taught accounting courses at the CBA School of Accountancy and at the Jeffrey S. Raikes School of Computer Science and Management since 2004. She received her MPA from UNL in 1990, and became a certified public accountant the following year
   


• Dr. Scott Murray, assistant professor of finance
  
  

  Dr. Scott Murray

  Murray has expertise in Empirical Asset Pricing, Investments, Market Efficiency, Pricing of Risk, Options Market and Derivatives. He received his Ph.D. from Baruch College earlier this year.
   


• Dr. Glenn Williams, assistant professor of practice in finance
  
  

  Dr. Glenn Williams

  Williams comes to CBA from The American University in Cairo. He has extensive teaching experience at several other universities, including the University of Florida where he was a graduate assistant and earned his Ph.D. in finance. Williams has taught in the U.S. at University of Central Florida, George Mason University and Florida Atlantic University.
   


• Dr. Varkey Titus, Jr., assistant professor of management (entrepreneurship/strategy)
  
  

  Dr. Varkey Titus Jr.

  Titus received his Ph.D. in strategic management and organizational theory/entrepreneurship from the Kelley School of Business at Big Ten member Indiana University earlier this year. He has been recognized in the past for excellence in both research and teaching, including winning the Panschar Undergraduate Teaching Award for Associate Instructors in 2011.
   


• Dr. Xin Zhao, assistant professor of marketing
  
  

  Dr. Xin Zhao

  Zhao received his Ph.D. in business administration (marketing) from the David Eccles School of Business at the University of Utah. He has expertise in the areas of consumer culture theory, market development in emerging economies and cultural aspects of consumption and branding. Most recently he taught at the University of Hawaii-Manoa.

Published: September 20, 2012