November 2026 Desk of the Dean
November 2026 From the Desk of the Dean
Sincerely,
Dr. Amit Ghosh
Dean
College of Business & Technology
Chaired by Dr. J.J. Arias
This month, we are highlighting the Department of Economics & Finance that helped pioneer undergraduate research at Georgia College and continues to train students for high-quality Ph.D. programs, as well as successful careers in finance and data analysis. The Department offers two degree programs designed to prepare students for exciting careers in very high-demand fields: a B.S. in Economics and a B.S. in Finance, as well as three minors in Economics, Finance and Business Administration. Our degree programs focus on developing analytical reasoning, quantitative skills and communication skills. Every year we have a handful of students present their research at the Academy of Economics & Finance, where three students have won the Best Undergraduate Paper Award since 2021. We have also had two students win the Undergraduate Research Award, awarded by Omicron Delta Epsilon, the International Honor Society in Economics.
The Department of Economics & Finance is home to several student organizations, including Omicron Delta Epsilon (Economics Honor Society), the Economics & Debate Club, the Finance Club and the Student Managed Investments Committee (SMIC). SMIC manages a portfolio of real assets, currently valued at over $120,000. Our students have access to six Bloomberg terminals and earn a Bloomberg certification in the finance capstone course. Every semester, our department offers an interdisciplinary practicum in collaboration with the Department of Psychological Science called the Georgia College Nudge Unit. The GC Nudge Unit is a student driven organization applying behavioral economic principles to solve problems for local businesses and organizations in Middle Georgia. In exchange for tailored, empirically supported solutions, student members gain the experience of applying classroom knowledge in the real world. The GC Nudge unit is currently working with Keep Milledgeville Baldwin Beautiful.
Assistant Professor of Finance
Written by Savannah Walker
Before Dr. Brent Evans was teaching Georgia College students how to responsibly manage their finances, he was a Georgia College student himself who wasn’t quite sure what he wanted to be.
From Music Major to Finance Professor
Evans arrived at GCSU as a music major, switched to math, and then landed on economics. He chose it, he admits, because it seemed like “business for smart people.” An intermediate microeconomics class taught by Dr. Chris Clark, professor of Economics, made it stick and proved that was the right field for him. After earning his B.S. in 2008, Evans completed a Ph.D. at Mississippi State, where he also taught. He went on to teach at Dalton State and Kennesaw State before joining the GCSU faculty in 2016. More recently, he added a Master of Financial Planning from UGA, a self-driven pursuit he squeezed in while balancing a full-time job and a family.
Research with Range
With nearly 30 peer-reviewed publications, Evans has studied everything from NFL quarterbacks to superhero box office hits. Lately, his focus has been on financial planning and the economic effects of gambling. He credits GCSU’s flexibility for the variety: “Nobody’s telling me what research to do.”
Personal Finance for Everyone
About seven years ago, Evans began teaching personal finance and it became his calling. The course only ran one section a semester. Now, it runs four to six sections in a semester, and they still fill up. His textbook, FreeFinanceBook.com, is free with no ads and built for self-learning. Non-finance majors are especially welcome to take his class or explore this textbook, as he believes they have the most to gain. Evans also shared his expertise beyond campus this fall as a featured speaker at the Georgia Secretary of State's free webinar, "Money Pitfalls Costing Millennials and Gen Z Thousands," where he discussed how to avoid costly money mistakes.
Why GCSU?
If you ask him his favorite part of Georgia College, Evans does not hesitate to say his colleagues. Other jobs might pay more, he says, but he “can’t imagine a group that gets along better” than his tight-knit department. The students are also major contributors to the appeal of GCSU. Whether or not they’re into finance or economics, they “care about something” and are “excited about life,” and he feeds off that curiosity.
Off the Clock
Evans enjoys golfing, hiking and mountain biking with his daughter. His family takes a long summer adventure every year, with past trips including a drive out west, a New England trip that ended in Bar Harbor, and a tour of the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands. The Alps are next. Naturally, he covers flights and hotels with credit card rewards, and he confesses that scheming is half the fun.
His Advice to Students
Evans’ top advice is to start thinking about the future as early as possible. “Right now, you have a lot of agency,” he says, and he’s “really big on agency.” College is when students have the most control over their major, their effort and the people they choose to be around. That includes their money, too.
“The more time you have for your money to grow, the better,” he says, so it’s never too early to start investing. Beyond the classroom, he encourages students to get involved in anything that interests them. Finance students should investigate the student-managed investment committee, which he calls a unique chance to manage real money and see the results. For everyone else, the advice is simple: join something, meet people who are different from you, and get out of your comfort zone.
Senior Director of Finance, Infrastructure Accounting and Reporting Controllership at Microsoft
Written by Savannah Walker
From Aspiring Economist to Accounting Leader
Buchi Rapu-Hodge came to Georgia College with a plan: become a development economist for third world countries at the World Bank. An International Student Scholarship sealed her decision to attend GCSU, and her first drive through Putnam County was a shock for someone from a "concrete jungle city." Today, she is Senior Director of Finance at Microsoft, leading Infrastructure Accounting and Reporting Controllership. Her team is responsible for the accounting behind Microsoft’s cloud and infrastructure investments. Her days blend strategy, talent development and business partnering. Working with smart people on meaningful work keeps her energized.
The Paper She Still Keeps
Growing up, Rapu-Hodge says, math "was always put on this pedestal," a subject seen as for the smartest students and often for boys. At Georgia College, she took additional math classes as electives. After a standout performance in Calculus II, her professor wrote on her paper: "You should be a math major." She still has that paper. It was proof, she says, that she had done what "everyone said was so hard.” She recently showed it to her nephew, now a math major at Georgia College: "Your auntie was told that she could be a math major." Small classes and close faculty relationships, she says, leave "that kind of mark in you," a lasting confidence that "you can do hard stuff."
Bringing Nigeria and the World to Milledgeville
One of her favorite activities as a student was her involvement with GCSU’s International Club. As a member and later officer for the club, her most cherished event was helping power the annual International Dinner, where students from at least 20 countries cooked, performed and shared their cultures with the Milledgeville community. Rapu-Hodge cooked with fellow Nigerians, then danced in a coordinated African dance number, in homemade costumes cut from safari-print fabric, to close the show. The dinner, she says, was "this gift that you brought from the world" to a community that welcomed international students.
The Path to Becoming a CPA
Her path to accounting was unplanned. After earning her master’s in finance, she took an accounting job at a fast-growing company, then learned that her background didn’t exactly match what employers wanted. Instead of fighting it, she took initiative and filled the gap. She mapped out a study plan on paper, scheduled her exams so they couldn’t be moved without a fee and earned her CPA in under six months. A quote she kept on her computer carried her through: "Whether you do it or you don't, the time is going to pass by anyways."
Her Advice to Students
Rapu-Hodge urges students not to over plan. “Good luck if you know what’s happening in five years,” she says. Instead, know your “why,” and remember that the human side of work matters most. “Be kind, be curious and be good. AI is already doing what we consider to be hard skills. What we think of as soft skills - the hard stuff of being human, is still up to us, and the people who are going to win are the people that really know the human stuff.”
On October 15, students from our Dean’s Student Advisory Board actively participated in celebrating 30 years as Georgia’s designated public liberal arts university by showcasing the values of liberal arts learning across various disciplines in business.
Our Student Managed Investment Committee demonstrated their work on managing a financial portfolio. Maggie McRae, a Data Science major and Economics minor, shared her summer internship experience at Bank of America on business analytics. Savannah Goode, senior Marketing major, presented her research on professional sales that led to the idea of the creation of an app, a dental office software system. These student engagement activities collectively demonstrate the high standards and commitment to academic excellence that are hallmarks of the college.
October was one of the busiest months yet for the Center, with projects reaching from the baseball diamond to the hospital floor, and a two-day visit from Amazon Web Services that put cloud and AI tools in front of more than 700 of our students.
AWS Comes to Campus
On October 20 and 21, the Center hosted two AWS engineers from Amazon Web Services for two full days of programming. They guest lectured to 773 GCSU students across multiple classes, gave live technology demonstrations, and led a hands-on workshop for 107 students. The visit ended with a codeathon in which 79 students built working projects using AWS Kiro, Amazon’s AI-powered development environment. For many students, it was their first chance to build software alongside the engineers who use these tools every day.
AACSB
All B.B.A. majors, BS Economics, BS Finance, and all graduate programs in the College of Business & Technology are accredited by AACSB International.
ABET
