JoJo Ciancio ’14
JoJo Ciancio ’14 came to Butler with a clear vision—find the perfect post-graduate job. He took advantage of opportunities provided through Butler’s Lacy School of Business to come out on top.
An Economics and Finance double major, Ciancio developed relationships with professors and attended campus networking events to embed himself in the Indianapolis community as a future business professional.
He found his first internship at Localstake, a community investment company, through a career fair held at Butler. Ciancio worked as a Financial Analyst and was able to watch the start-up company grow from the ground up.
He then scored a second internship at Pearl Street Venture Funds, a venture capital firm, through a connection to a Butler graduate.
“I’m really fortunate I came here because there aren’t many schools that can get so many internships for students,” he said. “It really helps you learn on-the-job skills, what employers look for, and how to apply skills you learn in class to real-world situations.”
A star on the football field, Ciancio was named the co-recipient of the first Pioneer Football League Scholar-Athlete of the Year. His teammates voted him senior captain during his final season, and he was chosen for the Pioneer Football League Academic Honor Roll for four consecutive years.
Ciancio said Butler provided him with the tools and the mindset to succeed in all aspects of life. Since graduating, he has been working as a Staff Consultant in the finance department at H. J. Umbaugh and Associates, a CPA firm in Indianapolis. In 2017, he was promoted to Senior Staff Consultant at the firm.
“The most important thing that Butler teaches you is that you have to be able to communicate with others,” he said. “In order to be successful in a job, but really at anything in life, you not only have to set goals, but you have to be able to communicate to peers, or a supervisor, what you want to accomplish.”
JoJo Ciancio ’14
JoJo came to Butler with goals—and met them.
This Team of Alumni Helped Butler Go Remote
PUBLISHED ON Jun 04 2020
Since the COVID-19 pandemic forced Butler University to move classes online in mid-March, the Center for Academic Technology (CAT) has been busy supporting faculty, staff, and students through the transition. While the demand for their services tripled, the CAT’s four Academic Technology Specialists put in the extra hours to make sure the heart of a Butler experience wasn’t lost in a virtual setting.
As a team made up of Butler grads, they know firsthand what makes the University special. Kristen Allen ’12 and Nick Wilson ’08 both completed undergraduate degrees at Butler, and Megan Grady, MA ’10 earned her master’s. Heather Hazelwood ’05, MS ’14 did both.
“Our whole team loves Butler,” Allen says. “We’re always excited to come alongside faculty to assist with classroom success.”
In recent months, that has meant working closely with instructors to mimic planned activities in an online setting. Faculty who felt most comfortable using overhead projectors switched to portable versions. Others used Zoom breakout rooms to provide spaces where students could continue collaborating in small groups to work on projects or practice foreign language skills. In some classes, interactive presentations were moved to online discussion boards, allowing students to still engage in meaningful conversations.
“I’ve seen faculty get really creative with their solutions,” Allen says. “Many of them have come to us and explained what they value most in their classrooms, and it’s a lot of what you think about when it comes to Butler in general: deep relationships with students. They didn’t want to lose that in moving to this remote online learning environment.”
When the CAT team saw the virus begin the spread across the nation in mid-February, they knew they needed to come up with a plan. By the time the University quickly switched to remote learning a month later, they had developed a resource to help guide faculty through the transition: Keep Calm and Teach On. Grady, who oversees a team of student-employees in the Information Commons program, also led the creation of the student-focused companion site Keep Calm and Study On.
The CAT specialists say they’ve watched faculty from across the University grow more comfortable with a variety of technologies throughout the semester, discovering the power of these new tools while becoming more confident in their ability to continue using them even after students are back in the classroom.
Meet the Dawgs of the CAT:
Kristen Allen ’12
Major: Math Education
“I absolutely loved my time at Butler. My professors were awesome mentors, and they helped me figure out what I wanted to do. Now, working here, I have the chance to revisit so many of the great memories I have from being on campus as a student.
In my four years at Butler, I was one of the first student-employees to participate in the Information Commons partnership between Butler Libraries and the Center for Academic Technology. After graduating, I worked for a wealth management company and did some nonprofit work, but I always loved Butler. I always loved teaching and technology. When there was an opening with the CAT, I applied right away, and I was really happy to be part of the team.
We really do function as a team. A lot of our success comes from good communication. For as small as our staff is, I’ve been amazed by how much knowledge the members of our team have.”
Megan Grady, MA ’10
MA Program: Master of Arts in English
“My liberal arts education taught me to love learning, which has been really useful when it comes to technology. I love finding ways that technology can enhance education.
Before coming to Butler, I spent several years working in other roles where I was teaching teachers how to teach. But I think my heart was always very much into liberal arts, and I wanted to find a position that would challenge me to go beyond my current skill set and learn new things.
I love working with faculty, listening to what they want to accomplish in their classrooms, and thinking through which resources are available to help them do that. I love solving problems, and I love the challenge of helping people feel more comfortable with technology—to make them feel like it’s something that’s within their control—something that can actually help them be efficient.”
Nick Wilson ’08
Major: Electronic Media
“After graduating from Butler, I found a position as a technician for a local K-12 school district. That’s where I discovered a passion for teaching people how to use technology. But I always wanted to come back to Butler, and I jumped at the chance to work with the CAT.
I love the lightbulb effect—when people start to understand a technology and see its full potential. For example, during the COVID-19 crisis, many faculty members have tried new things and realized they might want to use those tools in all their classes moving forward.
The biggest way my Butler education prepared me was by teaching me The Butler Way. I really feel that Butler is different from the average university because our faculty are so connected with the students. You really create a relationship with the faculty, and I think that makes a big difference.”
Heather Hazelwood ’05, MS ’14
Major: Recording Industry Studies
MS Program: Effective Teaching and Leadership
“After working at Butler for almost 10 years now, I don’t feel like I work with co-workers—I feel like I work with family. That’s something I treasure. I have built deep relationships with faculty, which helps me support them in meaningful ways.
My parents both went to Butler, then my mom worked at the University when I was in high school, so Butler just always seemed like the natural choice for me. I graduated from the first class of the Recording Industry Studies program in 2005. After about five years of experience in the hotel and conference center audiovisual industry, I found myself looking for a change. It seemed only natural to return to my alma mater, which I thankfully did in January 2011.
I strive to be a solution finder, and to find joy in helping others improve their teaching for the benefit of students. I also do my best to put others' needs before my own. While these qualities seem innate, I can’t deny that my experience as a student at Butler helped mold me into the person and the Academic Technology Specialist I am today.”
Media Contact:
Katie Grieze
News Content Manager
kgrieze@butler.edu
260-307-3403
This Team of Alumni Helped Butler Go Remote
Four grads in the Center for Academic Technology knew that strong relationships would be key to online learning
Four grads in the Center for Academic Technology knew that strong relationships would be key to online learning
Visiting Writing Series Announces Spring Speakers
PUBLISHED ON Dec 04 2017
Series begins February 1 with Kazim Ali.
Novelist/biographer Edmund White and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Louise Glück will be among the speakers this spring in Butler University’s Vivian S. Delbrook Visiting Writers Series.
The series begins February 1 with poet/novelist Kazim Ali and continues with novelist Ali Eteraz (February 15), poet Danez Smith (March 22), White (April 3), and Glück (April 18). Times and locations are below.
All events in the spring 2018 series are free and open to the public without tickets. For more information, call 317-940-9861.
More information about each speaker follows.
Kazim Ali
Thursday, February 1, 7:30 PM
Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall
Kazim Ali’s books include several volumes of poetry, including Sky Ward, winner of the Ohioana Book Award in Poetry; The Far Mosque, winner of Alice James Books’ New England/New York Award; The Fortieth Day; All One’s Blue; and the cross-genre text Bright Felon. He has received an Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council, and his poetry has been featured in Best American Poetry. His novels include The Secret Room: A String Quartet, and among his books of essays is Fasting for Ramadan: Notes from a Spiritual Practice.
Ali is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing and Comparative Literature at Oberlin College. His new book of poems, Inquisition, and a new hybrid memoir, Silver Road: Essays, Maps & Calligraphies, are scheduled for release in 2018.
Ali Eteraz
Thursday, February 15, 7:30 PM
Atherton Union, Reilly Room
Ali Eteraz is the author of the debut novel Native Believer, a New York TimesBook Review Editors’ Choice selection. He is also the author of the critically acclaimed memoir Children of Dust, which was selected as a New Statesman Book of the Year, won the Nautilus Book Award Gold, and was featured on PBS with Tavis Smiley, NPR with Terry Gross, C-SPAN2, and numerous international outlets. O, The Oprah Magazine, called it “a picaresque journey” and the book was long-listed for the Asian American Writers Workshop Award.
Previously, he wrote the short story collection Falsipedies and Fibsiennes. Other short stories have appeared in The Adirondack Review, storySouth, Chicago Quarterly Review, and Forge Journal.
Eteraz is an accomplished essayist and has been spotlighted by Time Magazine and Pageturner, the literary blog of The New Yorker.
Danez Smith
Thursday, March 22, 7:30 PM
Eidson-Duckwall Recital Hall
Danez Smith is the author of Don’t Call Us Dead (2017), finalist for the National Book Award in poetry; [insert] Boy (2014), winner of the Lambda Literary Award and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award; and the chapbook hands on ya knees. Their writing has appeared in many magazines and journals, such as Poetry, Ploughshares, Beloit Poetry Journal, and Kinfolks. Smith is a 2011 Individual World Poetry Slam finalist and the reigning two-time Rustbelt Individual Champion and was on the 2014 championship team Sad Boy Supper Club.
In 2014, they were the festival director for the Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam and were awarded a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry fellowship from the Poetry Foundation.
Edmund White
Tuesday, April 3, 7:30 PM
Atherton Union, Reilly Room
Edmund White is America’s preeminent gay writer. In biography, social history, travel writing, journalism, the short story, and the novel, this prolific and versatile author has chronicled the gay experience in the United States from the closeted 1950s through the AIDS crisis and beyond.
His first novel, Forgetting Elena, published in 1973, is the story of an amnesia victim, set at a stylish resort reminiscent of Fire Island. With the classic coming-of-age tale A Boy’s Own Story, White cemented a place for himself—and for gay fiction—in the cultural consciousness. His celebrated fiction also includes Nocturnes for the King of Naples, Caracole, The Beautiful Room Is Empty (winner of the 1988 Lambda Literary Award), The Farewell Symphony, The Married Man, Fanny: A Fiction, Hotel de Dream, and Jack Holmes and His Friend. His latest is Our Young Man.
White has been involved in the gay rights movement since the Stonewall riots in New York City in 1969 and has acted as one of its canniest observers. His pioneering The Joy of Gay Sex: An Intimate Guide for Gay Men to the Pleasures of a Gay Lifestyle was published in 1977 and served as a national coming-out announcement for the entire gay community.
White has also made his mark as a highly accomplished biographer. Genet: A Biography is recognized as a definitive work on writer and playwright Jean Genet, and in 1993 it won both the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Lambda Literary Award. White also authored the well-received Marcel Proust and Rimbaud: The Double Life of a Rebel. His memoir Inside a Pearl: My Years in Paris recounts the fifteen years he spent living there—one of the most productive and creative phases in his career.
White is a regular contributor to The Times Literary Supplement, The New York Times Book Review, and Vanity Fair, and is a member of both the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Louise Glück
Wednesday, April 18, 7:30 PM
Atherton Union, Reilly Room
Louise Glück is the author of twelve books of poetry and served as the U.S. Poet Laureate from 2003-2004. In 1993 Glück won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for her collection The Wild Iris. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Rockefeller and Guggenheim Foundations and from the National Endowment for the Arts. Other honors include the Academy of American Poets Prize, the William Carlos Williams Award, the Bobbitt National Poetry Prize, the Ambassador Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and her most recent book of poems Faithful and Virtuous Nightxs received the 2014 National Book Award. Her book of essays Proofs and Theories: Essays on Poetry (1994) was awarded the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for Nonfiction, and her book Vita Nova (2001) won the first New YorkerReaders Award. In 2001 Yale University recognized her lifetime achievement by awarding her its Bollingen Prize for Poetry.
Glück is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and currently serves as the Rosenkranz Writer-in-Residence in the Department of English at Yale University.
Media contact:
Marc Allan
mallan@butler.edu
317-940-9822
Visiting Writing Series Announces Spring Speakers
The series begins February 1 with poet/novelist Kazim Ali and continues with novelist Ali Eteraz (February 15), Barry (March 1), poet Danez Smith (March 22), White (April 3), and Glück (April 18). Times and locations are below.
The series begins February 1 with poet/novelist Kazim Ali and continues with novelist Ali Eteraz (February 15), Barry (March 1), poet Danez Smith (March 22), White (April 3), and Glück (April 18). Times and locations are below.
Butler’s Risk Management and Insurance Program Authors Pandemic Act to Bolster Economy
PUBLISHED ON Apr 02 2020
A case study on PayPal, completed by Butler University undergraduates in 2017, could help save the U.S. economy in 2020.
Zach Finn, Clinical Professor and Director of the Davey Risk Management and Insurance program at Butler, and some of his former students have developed the Pandemic Risk Insurance Act (PRIA). If passed, the legislation would provide a reinsurance backstop to cover losses in the insurance sector due to future pandemic outbreaks, such as the ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus crisis. The act has already been adopted by the U.S. House Financial Services Committee, which is calling for its passing in Washington, DC.
The policy combines the students’ 2017 case study work on mitigation and monetization of global cyber risk—essentially, steps to reduce the negative effects of threats and disasters on business continuity—with a framework similar to the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act. The students studied the possibility of a black swan—a rare, unpredictable event with severe consequences that would lead to a cyber shutdown in America. Their solution was the development of a hypothetical Cyber Risk Insurance Act, which would protect the United States against the financial impacts of a widespread cyber-attack. The idea and research were meant to urge a federal backstop for uninsured losses resulting from the shutdown of large portions of the economy.
Now, the PRIA draws on that concept. It would create a federal backstop—or last-resort financial support—for future, and possibly even current, losses that companies would face from a pandemic event. Finn sent the act to Indiana and federal governments in mid-March, and it has already landed on desks in the White House and Congress.
“We will never have a March Madness again unless the government backstops it,” Finn says. “The PRIA would allow businesses to have a fair shot of getting coverage in the case of a pandemic. No insurance companies would take this on now, so that kind of protection would require an act like this. Without a backstop, what happens if we have to shut down every 10 years like this? What if we have to shut down every three years like this?”
Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Chair of the U.S. House Financial Services Committee, explains her support of the PRIA, “By requiring higher capital and liquidity buffers, banks are well-positioned to continue lending and play an important countercyclical role. However, America’s consumers, small businesses, and vulnerable populations are suffering. It is time for a policy and fiscal response to address their needs.”
Finn says the act would protect venues from losing revenue due to the cancellation of large events like the NCAA basketball tournament. It would also lessen the ripple effect that major event losses can have on area businesses.
“If you’re running a major convention center or something like Lucas Oil Stadium,” Finn says, “it would be a completely common professional standard that they would offer pandemic insurance.”
The PRIA could also provide an alternative to federal government bailouts, Finn continues. Businesses do take advantage of business interruption insurance, but that only covers events like fire, lightning, or wind. Business loss due to pandemics are not in the mix, yet.
Real life application
Nick Fox ’17 was part of the four-student team representing Butler at the spring 2017 Spencer Education Foundation’s Risk Management Challenge case competition, which explored options for insuring PayPal. His teammates included Erin Bundy ’17, Jessica Parada ’17, and Matt Pauszek ’17.
While placing third in the competition, the students’ analysis of what PayPal could do in the event of a cyber blackout turned heads. The PayPal risk manager congratulated the Butler students and took their Cyber Risk Insurance Act into serious consideration.
“She said our solution could truly be implemented in real life,” Fox recalls. “Three years removed, it could still be a focal point in the industry. It adds even more validity to the work we did.”
The students’ proposition was meant to protect businesses from a dire circumstance like the internet crashing or a global pandemic. It’s debatable which event would be more catastrophic, but Finn says the students' ideas from three years ago could help the U.S. today.
Climbing the insurance ranks
Today, Fox and his former teammates are all advancing within their respective insurance companies. Fox finished his studies at Butler a semester early and was quickly hired as a cyber risk analyst for middle market corporations and businesses at Marsh & McLennan Companies, based out of Chicago, Illinois. He is currently transitioning to a consultant position, working with risk managers and chief financial officers of Fortune 500 companies.
“The past few months, I’ve been focusing on emerging risks, one of which is COVID-19,” Fox says. “I’ve been consulting with different clients on things like violent threat modeling and cyber stress tests.”
Pauszek is a Risk Management Analyst for the University of Notre Dame. He has leaned on his Butler experience, especially since COVID-19 grew to pandemic levels in March.
“Faced with situations of uncertainty and crisis, the lessons I learned have equipped me with both the technical industry knowledge and the overall confidence to identify and execute creative business solutions,” Pauszek says. “I believe the Davey Program has built a culture that emphasizes and encourages students to approach their careers with an innovative outlook and careful consideration for others that makes them extremely valuable in their surrounding communities.”
Fox considers his training at Butler key to his early career success, too. The enactment of PRIA would be another boost to his career.
“It’ll put Butler University itself in its rightful place on the map in terms of Risk Management and Insurance,” Fox says. “This is going to create an opportunity for us to put our ideas in the forefront of the country.”
The PRIA is also fast-ascending. The piece of potential policy could be a boost to the U.S. economy in years to come.
“It’s not really a question of if another pandemic is going to happen,” Fox says, “it’s more so when and how serious.”
Media Contact:
Katie Grieze
News Content Manager
kgrieze@butler.edu
260-307-3403
Butler’s Risk Management and Insurance Program Authors Pandemic Act to Bolster Economy
Clinical Professor Zach Finn and his former students’ work is being lobbied by the U.S. House Financial Services Committee
Clinical Professor Zach Finn and his former students’ work is being lobbied by the U.S. House Financial Services Committee