Jul 16, 2007 -- A nationally prominent expert and prolific author on management information systems and the international aspects of business, who helped build both the University of Delaware’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics and Case Western Reserve University’s Weatherhead School of Management into world-class research, teaching, and training departments, has been named dean of Sy Syms School of Business at Yeshiva University. The appointment of Dr. Michael Ginzberg, who served from 2000 to 2006 as dean of Lerner College, where he was also the Chaplin Tyler Professor of Business, was announced today by Yeshiva University President Richard M. Joel and Mort Lowengrub, vice president for academic affairs. The appointment is effective immediately. “Sy Syms School of Business is part of a very serious undergraduate enterprise at Yeshiva University—one which, through its commitment to excellence, creativity, and collaboration, plays an integral role in our mission of upholding and promoting the ideals of Torah Umadda [the confluence of Torah and secular knowledge],” said President Joel. “In Dean Michael Ginzberg, we have not only an educator of rigor and experience, but someone who both respects that mission and who knows the value of dreams.” Added Dr. Lowengrub: “Following an exhaustive and rigorous national search, we are privileged to have Dr. Ginzberg as our new business school dean. His outstanding amalgam of skills, his creative vision, and his dynamic leadership abilities will serve us well as we move forward on securing Sy Syms School of Business’ position among the top echelon of undergraduate business schools in the US.” Dr. Ginzberg, a resident of Hockessin, DE, has been serving since 2006 as a pro bono special consultant to the president of Tulane University in New Orleans, helping develop a strategy and implementation plan for a new school of science and engineering. He said he is excited about coming to Sy Syms School of Business because of its “unwavering commitment to preparing students not just for the challenges and complexities of today’s business world but also to be industry leaders of unquestionable ethics and principles. “Because of the school's dual curriculum, combining a comprehensive business education with the strongest undergraduate Jewish studies program in the country,” Dr. Ginzberg said, “Sy Syms School of Business students are imbued with the skills and values necessary to make significant contributions in their professional pursuits, their communities, and society at large.” Dr. Ginzberg was also attracted to the deanship because it provides an ideal opportunity to build the school, which he said has “enormous potential.” To this end, he will focus in the immediate future on securing accreditation by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, enhancing existing undergraduate programs, establishing a comprehensive honors program, and exploring the introduction of selective graduate programs. Dr. Ginzberg has amassed an impressive record in accomplishing such goals at other institutions. At the University of Delaware, his tenure as the Lerner College dean was highlighted by the establishment of the John Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, securing the endowment to name the school, strengthening several departments, and introducing graduate programs in the management of systems and technology and organizational change. He also secured a $10 million contract from the US Agency for International Development to develop a graduate school of business in Sarajevo. Prior to that deanship, Dr. Ginzberg served as a professor and associate dean of the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve. During his 15-year tenure there, he built the information systems department, which is widely regard by academic colleagues as one of the nation’s top information systems research departments, focusing on behavioral and organizational issues. He also established the Center for Management of Science and Technology, an interdisciplinary center for research and teaching; exchange programs with business schools in several European and Latin American countries; and an MBA program in partnership with the International Management Center in Budapest. Dr. Ginzberg, who has also held faculty positions at Columbia University and New York University, earned his doctorate in management in 1975 from the Alfred P. Sloan School of Management at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His MBA in economic analysis is from Iona College and his undergraduate degree is from MIT. A native of Cincinnati who grew up in South Florida and Westchester County, NY, Dr. Ginzberg has held leadership positions in various professional organizations, including two terms as chairperson of the Executive Committee of the International Conference on Information Systems, president of the Society for Information Management (Northeast Ohio Chapter), board member of the International Management Center, board of trustees chairperson of the Sarajevo Graduate School of Business, and board member of Beta Alpha Psi, the honorary society for accounting and financial information professionals. He is a fellow of the Association for Information Systems. He is the author and/or editor of more than 50 articles and books on information systems development and management, information technology strategy, and organizational change, and the recipient of a number of major grants. In his Jewish community leadership, Dr. Ginzberg has served on the board of the Jewish Federation of Delaware; Congregation Beth Shalom in Wilmington, DE; Hillel at the University of Delaware; Bellefaire Jewish Children’s Bureau; and Congregation Bethaynu in Ohio. He and his wife, Rosemary, have two sons: Matthew, an investment banker with JP Morgan Chase in New York, and David, an incoming freshman at the University of Delaware. Sy Syms School of Business was founded in 1987 through the leadership and support of national clothier, civic leader, and philanthropist, Sy Syms. Over the past few years, the school has established an outstanding record in each of its areas of concentration. In this period, the school has grown three-fold and its alumni are now making their mark in prestigious firms in the business world.