by M. C. Jennings | Dec 4, 2015 | Academics, COBA Staff, Current Students, Uncategorized
What is your educational background?
I graduated from ACU with Social Work degree in 1988.
Frankie Montgomery
What is your work background?
I worked as an assistant for a CPA in Ft. Worth before coming to ACU. While at ACU I worked as the assistant director in Gardner Dorm and director in McDonald Dorm. After graduation I worked as a social worker with Big Brothers Big Sisters. I was honored to work at home while our children were little and went back to work at Big Brothers Big Sisters about the time they were in middle school.
What do you do at COBA?
I assist (read: try to keep up with) Dr. Lytle, oversee the COBA budget and the various tasks associated with the upkeep of the Mabee Business Building. I’m also on the staff senate.
What’s the best part of working with students?
The fresh energy that students exude and the creativity and talent they are developing is inspirational – and I’m not exaggerating. It’s really fun watching students become who they are. Making new friends is one of my favorite things so connecting with students is really fun to me. I’m in a good place!
Outside of ACU, what passions and hobbies do you have?
I enjoy gardening, traveling, antique shopping, cooking/baking, camping (mostly the part where I sit by the fire), visiting with friends and keeping connected with them. All of these things are more fun when I’m in the company of my husband, Monty. (We’ve been married 25 years!) We also care for my 92 year old father who lives 3 blocks away from us in his own home. I enjoy anything that touches, affects, is related to or involves either of our kids who are both at ACU: Seth (Senior) and Leah (sophomore). They are both pretty cool people, to say the very least. I spend a good deal of time praying for them, their friends, their future spouses and their lives in general.
Monty and Frankie Montgomery
What is a good, early story about your first job or when you were in college?
Well, I made it to my very last week of college before being thrown into the GATA fountain. (That used to be a thing when the fountain was like a shallow wading pool.)
Do you do any charity or non-profit work?
I have been a Big Sister with Big Brothers Big Sisters for 5 years. My Little Sister is 15 now!
Who is your role model, and why?
My role model has always been my mother. Although she died 22 years ago she continues to influence me. Mom came to know God when I was approaching my teen years so I had a front row seat at a pretty critical time to observe her and my dad as they made significant changes in their lives to follow Christ. I learned about accepting grace and desiring to please God and being real and being hospitable from her. I also learned from her the value of giving people a chance. She really grasped the concept of God doing mighty things when people are open to Him and not giving up on people because of that.
Who was your most inspirational professor and why?
John Willis, of course. His teaching was excellent and he had a way of making sure the students knew he was available to us. And those windmill cookies were to die for.
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Frankie and her son, Seth
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Frankie and her daughter, Leah
If you could have a superpower, what would it be and why?
Okay, I always hate this question. But if time travel was a superpower I would pick that. There are a couple of moments in history I’d really like to witness.
What is something that students might be surprised to find out about you?
That I lived in Scotland for a little over a year between my Sophomore and Junior year at ACU.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 24, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research, Uncategorized
Now that week 12 is in the record books, the College Football Playoff (CFP) selection committee will meet today and update their rankings which are a big deal because, when the smoke clears at the end of the college season, the top 4 ranked teams will play in the playoff bowl games to determine the overall number one team. Teams 5,6,… are left to play in such memorable bowl games as the Tidy Bowl.
So, I am sitting here by the phone, waiting for the CFP committee to call for advice. You see, over the last 3 weekends, the Jessup Pope (JP) ranking system has predicted 75% correctly for games involving top 25 teams, while predictions based on the weekly CFP rankings only got 66% correct.
Just in case you are wondering, our top 4 are now Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Alabama, and Michigan State. Clemson and Arkansas are the next 2 teams “on the bubble” of making it in. Our JP rankings continue to be less impressed with our regional favorites TCU, Baylor, and Okie State.
Surely the phone will ring any minute now….
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 23, 2015 | Academics, Careers In..., COBA Faculty, Current Students, Human Resource Management, Uncategorized
Every year, Dr. Malcolm Coco holds a business and dining etiquette dinner for students in his MGMT 373: Employee Planning, Recruitment & Selection class. This year, he held the dinner on Tuesday, Nov. 17th.
Throughout the course, students are taught the importance during the recruitment, interviewing, and selection process for filling jobs, and that personal appearance, non-verbal communication, and dining and business etiquette are very important to employers. Any one of these can disqualify you as a job candidate or make you a winner. After class instruction on all of these subjects along with a research assignment, the students have the opportunity to actually practice what they have learned with their classmates during a formal dinner and simulated meeting environment.
The dinner is the culmination of Dr. Coco’s planning, recruitment, and selection class. Students receive formal invitations and must RSVP to attend the dinner. Jennifer Ellison, ACU’s Director of University Events, partners with Dr. Coco in classroom instruction and constructive criticism during the event to give feedback and instruction to the students. A very elegant, five course meal is served and the students practice their dining manners and protocol. This has always been a highlight of the course. Unfortunately, in society today, proper manners and dining etiquette has become a lost art, but not so with hiring managers. Good manners and dining decorum can be the tie breaker during the interview process and cinch the job you really want.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 19, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research, Uncategorized
I am enjoying my research with Dr. Ryan Jessup about the applications of Google’s page rank algorithm to other uses, including ranking sports teams. Believe it or not, this stuff actually relates to the courses that I teach at ACU. This data crunching and analysis of college football results involves statistics, mathematical optimization and model fitting, and cause-effect analysis, all of which relate to the 3 courses that I am teaching this semester: Statistics, Management Science, and Quality Management.
Now, about the title of this blog post. I am a proud Aggie Industrial Engineer, and it hurt my pride enormously when my Aggies dropped from our carefully calculated rank of 32 to 52 after the Saturday November 14th weekend. You see, our algorithm does not accept game results when a big school like Texas A&M plays “Roast Beef Tech” (with apologies to Western Carolina fans). So, A&M dropped in our rankings below such traditional football powers as Bowling Green and those unworthy academic establishments in Austin and Lubbock, Texas. Wow. That hurts.
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 17, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, College Decisions, Current Students, Human Resource Management, Uncategorized
Senior management major, Hayley Griffin, was honored at the HR Southwest Conference (HRSWC) on October 26th, as she was one of four students who received The Excellence in Education Student Scholarship. Recipients of this scholarship are chosen based upon their academic standing, involvement in their community and campus, and by recommendations of their professors, advisors and/or employers.
Hayley Griffin
Dr. Malcolm Coco, professor and SHRM Student Chapter Advisor, nominated Hayley for the scholarship. Dr. Coco said that Hayley has proven to be an outstanding employee, currently working in the ACU HR department and as a student assistant to the COBA marketing and recruiting manager. He touted Hayley’s intelligence, personable demeanor, abilities, accomplishments and work ethic. As the current president of the SHRM student chapter, he said that Hayley has shown initiative and leadership as she attends professional chapter meetings and has supported the chapter’s request for student chapter involvement in joint activities and research. Hayley is also treasurer of the women’s social club Sigma Theta Chi, a member of Phi Eta Sigma Honor Society and is on the Dean’s Honor Roll.
Dr. Coco went on to say that, “Whether she is performing volunteer work for Meals on Wheels, Habitat for Humanity or volunteer tutoring for an elementary school, she is always totally engaged. The bottom line is that Hayley continues to excel in every aspect of her life and has demonstrated superb initiative and leadership. She is the epitome of an all-around outstanding person. Whether it is academics, service to the community, involvement in campus activities, she is always leading the way. She is a top drawer person.”
Hayley receiving The Excellence in Education Scholarship
The HRSWC is a regional human resources conference held in Fort Worth every October. The conference is a 3 day event filled with educational sessions, keynote speakers, and networking opportunities. The educational sessions focus on 8 different areas in HR ranging from benefits to HR development to recruiting the best talent. This year the keynote speakers were David Pogue, the founder of Yahoo Tech, and Soledad O’Brien, the founder of Starfish Media Group.
As a student attending HRSWC, Hayley said, “There are so many outstanding networking opportunities to grow your professional network. There is a market place in the convention center that over 200 companies set up booths to tell people about their company and solutions, so it’s almost like networking heaven! There are some educational sessions geared towards students and how to go about the internship/job search, how to network, and how to get the most out of the conference. This year my favorite session was titled ‘Essential Global Recognition and Engagement Insights’. The speaker presented research that was conducted on different companies across the global market and the differences in how incentive pay and culture are linked. For example, in Brazil, employees expect to be recognized differently than here in the US, in India, or in the UK. It was interesting to hear about cultural differences like this and I am looking forward to being able to use what I learned not only from this session, but the entire conference, into my future career.”
The Society for Human Resource Management student chapter is sponsored by the local professional human resources chapter. There are 27 professional and student chapters in the state of Texas. The Big Country SHRM is ACU’s sponsoring chapter and provides all types of support for the student chapter. Student officers are part of the professional chapter’s executive committee and regularly attend monthly meetings. The student chapter members are also invited to attend each month’s chapter meeting to hear the presentation for that month. The Big Country SHRM also supports the students by offering scholarships for attending the state SHRM annual conference and the student leadership conference. The student chapter provides support for the professional chapter by conducting surveys to gather information from its members and provides support for professional chapter activities.
The student chapter is one of 27 in the state of Texas and over 400 nationally. Over 10,000 students belong to SHRM student chapters. Each student must be chartered and sponsored by a professional chapter. ACU’s chapter is sponsored by the Big Country SHRM professional chapter. The Society of Human Resource Management is the world’s largest association devoted to human resource management. The society serves the needs of HR professionals and advances the interests of the HR profession. Founded in 1948, SHRM has more than 225,000 members in over 125 countries, and more than 575 affiliated chapters. Visit shrm.org
by M. C. Jennings | Nov 12, 2015 | Academics, COBA Faculty, Current Students, Research
Here are the JP College Football Rankings after the 10th week of the season. (See our first post for a brief explanation of our methodology.)
Our top two teams, Notre Dame and Clemson, remain unchanged and Alabama’s big win over LSU moved them from 6th to 3rd place. Notice that ours and the College Football Playoff (CFP) rankings agree on 3 out of the 4 top. Yet here is one way we can see a dramatic difference between our ranking system and the more traditional polls and rankings.
In our rankings last week, Michigan State and Michigan were 9 and 10, respectively. This week, Michigan State, who lost, moved up 2 positions and Michigan, who won, moved down 4 places. This is because the former narrowly lost on the road to a decent Nebraska team (#19) whereas the latter won at home against a very weak Rutgers side (#104). Similar movements occurred all throughout our rankings. Another major difference between ours and more traditional ranking systems is that ours is forward-looking, meaning it is meant to predict future outcomes whereas more traditional systems are primarily designed to reward past performance. This is why a 3 loss USC is ranked 4th in our system (#3 last week) yet they are outside the top 25 of the AP poll. Baylor remains unchanged from last week at #60. A good performance against a very strong OU team (#5) this Saturday will probably see them rise, even with a loss. The top 50 teams are listed at the end of this blog post.
Relationship with courses we teach
One might reasonably ask what this has to do with the courses we teach. It turns out, quite a lot! For example, one of the courses I teach, data mining, initially involves separating data into two datasets or partitions. We then run our algorithm on the first partition to teach it. Next, we examine how well it forecasts the results in the second partition. This is exactly how we came up with these rankings. The benefit of this partitioning process is that when we say that we can beat the Vegas line 56% of the time, it means we are beating it on new data, not merely data that our algorithm used to learn. It is actually very easy to “predict” results that you are using to learn; what is hard is predicting or rather forecasting results that are new. In a later post we’ll discuss some of these ideas and their relationship with what we teach in greater detail. We will also examine other research applications of this ranking system.
| 1 |
Notre Dame |
| 2 |
Clemson |
| 3 |
Alabama |
| 4 |
USC |
| 5 |
Oklahoma |
| 6 |
Tennessee |
| 7 |
Michigan State |
| 8 |
Stanford |
| 9 |
Utah |
| 10 |
Florida |
| 11 |
LSU |
| 12 |
Ohio State |
| 13 |
Florida State |
| 14 |
Michigan |
| 15 |
Oklahoma State |
| 16 |
Mississippi State |
| 17 |
Wisconsin |
| 18 |
Ole Miss |
| 19 |
Nebraska |
| 20 |
Penn State |
| 21 |
Washington |
| 22 |
Texas |
| 23 |
TCU |
| 24 |
Louisville |
| 25 |
California |
| 26 |
Georgia Tech |
| 27 |
Navy |
| 28 |
Temple |
| 29 |
Arkansas |
| 30 |
BYU |
| 31 |
Texas A&M |
| 32 |
Pittsburgh |
| 33 |
Cincinnati |
| 34 |
Texas Tech |
| 35 |
Iowa |
| 36 |
UCLA |
| 37 |
South Carolina |
| 38 |
Bowling Green |
| 39 |
Memphis |
| 40 |
East Carolina |
| 41 |
Central Michigan |
| 42 |
North Carolina |
| 43 |
Auburn |
| 44 |
Oregon |
| 45 |
West Virginia |
| 46 |
Virginia |
| 47 |
NIU |
| 48 |
Western Kentucky |
| 49 |
Houston |
| 50 |
Northwestern |
