Waleed Rezooqi, Yelena Abalmazova and Rohan Mehta

April 21, 2008 - (ATLANTA) - Twelve undergraduate students from the J. Mack Robinson College of Business Portfolio Management Team returned from the RISE VIII Conference in Dayton, Ohio, as a top winner of the conference's oral and poster portfolio competition. RISE, Redefining Investment Strategy Education, is the most prestigious investment education conference in the world. Speakers at the conference included FOMC member and Cleveland Federal Reserve President Sandra Pianalto, and Merrill Lynch Chief Economist David Rosenberg. Dr. Bob Froehlich of Deutsche Asset Management served as moderator.

"The students were just terrific. They competed in an oral and poster competition amongst the top business schools in the nation and performed like the professionals I know them to be," said faculty advisor Genna Brown. The students manage a fund that has grown to more than $350,000 from an initial donation of $25,000 from C&S Bank (now Bank of America). The students outperformed the S&P 500 Index again in 2007 by an attractive margin and are doing quite well in this difficult market environment, added Brown.

The conference included a keynote speech from Christopher Gardner, who is now the President and CEO of Christopher Gardner International Holdings, and was the subject of the movie The Pursuit of Happiness. Rohan Mehta, a senior Finance and Marketing major and Chief Economist of the Portfolio Management Team, served as a distinguished student panelist and had the opportunity to question Gardner about his success. Rohan asked Gardner how he succeeded without the college degree all the students at the conference were working so hard to achieve. He told the students he was determined to achieve financial independence and vowed not to let anything stop him and encouraged the students to do the same. "A good lesson for all of us," said Mehta.

John Jarvis, CIO of the Team; Robert Edwards; Mayur Patel; and Mehta made a presentation to senior investment professionals from major Wall Street firms. The presentation was well-received and gave the students valuable feedback as to ways in which they can continue to learn and improve their portfolio's performance.

Airfare for the students and their advisor was generously donated by AirTran Airways. Had it not been for the support of AirTran, the students may not have been able to attend this prestigious conference. "How else could we have gotten there?" asked Aditya Kapashi. "We so appreciate AirTran's generosity."

The Portfolio Management Team also includes Yelena Ablamazova, Zainob Fashola, Daniel Cha, Claibourne Darden, Waleed Rezooqi, Matthew Carey and Adam Breit. All the students are members of GSU's Finance Society. The Portfolio Management Team is an extracurricular activity for which the students receive only hands-on experience, no school credit or compensation.

RISE VIII is sponsored by the University of Dayton and draws more than 2,000 undergraduate and graduate students annually from more than 200 colleges and universities in the U.S. and internationally.

The J. Mack Robinson College of Business is one of the top-ranked business schools. The College's Flex (part-time) MBA program has been listed in the top 10 by U.S. News & World Report for the past 12 years and its undergraduate business program is ranked among the top 50 in the nation. The College's Executive MBA program is listed on The Financial Times list of the world's top-ranked offerings. Georgia State University's Robinson College of Business has an enrollment for more than 7,000 students and has locations throughout the Atlanta metro area including its main campus in downtown Atlanta, Buckhead, Alpharetta and Henry County.

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