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K-State Today

July 28, 2015

Finance department head Eric Higgins named director of the Center for Economic Education

Submitted by Brent Fritzemeier

Eric Higgins has been named director of the Center for Economic Education at Kansas State University. The appointment was jointly announced by the university and the Kansas Council for Economic Education.

In addition to being head of the finance department in the College of Business Administration, Higgins has been recognized by the Kansas Board of Regents with its faculty of distinction designation and fills the endowed von Waaden Chair of Investment Management.

The center will be part of the larger Integrated Investment Management Initiative in the finance department. The initiative strives to be a leader in providing experiential learning opportunities to all of its constituencies. The addition of the Center for Economic Education will allow the initiative to expand its outreach activities to the citizens of Kansas consistent with the land-grant mission of the university.

The Kansas Council for Economic Education, or KCEE, is a nonprofit entity organized under IRC Section 501(c)(3). Although it is a separate legal entity, the council is affiliated with all of Kansas’ six public universities and is hosted by the W. Frank Barton School of Business at Wichita State University. The vision of the council is that every Kindergarten through 12th-grade student in Kansas will become economically and financially literate so they will be more knowledgeable consumers, wiser savers and investors, better employees, and more responsible citizens.

In order to reach as many students as possible, the mission of the council is to equip teachers to teach economics and personal finance. The council equips teachers by providing professional development events, by providing tuition assistance to enable them to take courses for graduate credit through its affiliated universities, by providing standards-based curriculum resources, and by providing programs and competitions that engage students through experiential learning and practical applications of knowledge.

As director of the university's Center for Economic Education, Higgins will speak at the Kansas Council for Economic Education’s professional development events for Kindergarten through 12th-grade teachers, designate courses that teachers may take for graduate credit, and participate in the university’s outreach to teachers, to school districts in its geographical area, and to the community.