Press Releases Chicago Booth Students receive scholarships from Siebel, McGowan

Five students at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business have been named 2017 Siebel Scholars and one student was named a 2017 McGowan Fellow.

The Siebel Scholars are Sruti Balakrishnan, Christopher Cruickshank, Max Gelb, Jonathan Pack, Craig Poeppelman. The McGowan Fellow is Jonathan Chun-Hung Fung.

The Chicago Booth Siebel Scholars join a total of 20 Siebel Scholars selected this year from the world’s leading graduate schools of business. The students, nominated by the deans of their respective schools, are recognized for their academic excellence, leadership and ability to play a significant role in addressing global challenges. On average, they rank in the top 5 percent of their class, and many rank within the top 1 percent. The Siebel scholars receive a $35,000 award for their second year of studies.

The Siebel Foundation, based in Redwood City, Calif., established the Siebel Scholars program in 2000 through grants to 16 universities in the United States, China, France, Italy and Japan. A total of 92 graduate students from around the world in the fields of business, computer science, bioengineering and energy science received Siebel scholarship awards this year.

McGowan Fellows are recognized for academic excellence and a commitment to ethical leadership. Over the next year, a total of 10 fellows from business schools across the U.S. will work together on a social impact project in which they will tackle a challenge around preventative medical care. The program provides full tuition for these second-year MBA students.

The McGowan Fellows program was established in 2010 by the William G. McGowan Charitable Fund, a Chicago-based family foundation. The program aims to provide the resources and guidance to young professionals to become ethical, accountable leaders and role models for generations to come.

Meet the Siebel Scholars:

Prior to joining Booth, Sruti Balakrishnan worked in the education sector, serving as the deputy director of jobs initiatives for Hope Street Group, an education and workforce development nonprofit. There, she helped Fortune 500 companies revamp their hiring strategies to attract and retain nontraditional candidates. Additionally, she served as the vice president of content at Kibbit, an education technology startup, where she created online courses designed to help college students land their first job. She has also worked at McKinsey & Company as a business analyst. She graduated with distinction from the University of Virginia in 2011, majoring in both commerce and economics. This summer, Sruti worked as a senior product manager in the Kindle Higher Education team at Amazon.com.

Christopher Cruickshank is a second-year MBA student with intended concentrations in finance and accounting. Over the summer, he interned as an equity research analyst with MFS Investment Management. Before joining Booth, Chris worked as an associate with Penfund, a middle market private equity firm in Toronto, where he helped develop a new investment thesis around craft beer. Prior to Penfund, Chris spent three years as a consultant with the Monitor Group where he worked on engagements across the media, technology, and pharmaceutical industries. Chris graduated from Queen’s University (Canada) with a Bachelor of Commerce Degree.

Max Gelb is a second-year MBA student pursuing concentrations in finance and economics. Max is developing a career in investment management, which began with a summer internship conducting sell-side equity research for Goldman Sachs in 2010. Subsequently, Max worked for Cambridge Associates as an investment consultant to university endowments, pension funds, and high net worth individuals. In this role, he advised institutional investors on asset allocation, portfolio construction, and fund manager selection. After nearly three years in Cambridge Associates’ Boston headquarters, Max spent over a year in London building the firm’s European pension business. This summer, Max is completing an internship with PAAMCO, a fund of hedge funds based in Irvine, Calif., where he is researching the relative merits of growth versus value stocks and evaluating hedge fund managers. Max received a BA in Economics from Dartmouth College in 2011, and he is a CFA charterholder.

Jonathan Pack is a second-year MBA student studying finance and general and strategic management. Prior to attending Booth, he worked in Ernst & Young’s transaction advisory services group. He developed financial analyses to estimate the values of shareholder’s equity and intangible assets, such as trademarks and intellectual property, acquired in cross-border transactions. Jonathan coordinated with due diligence and tax teams to present an integrated set of transaction structuring recommendations to clients primarily in the media and entertainment and renewable energy industries. Outside of the office, he partnered with nonprofit organization Chrysalis to conduct weekly GED tutoring sessions for economically disadvantaged individuals living in downtown Los Angeles. After graduating from Booth, Jonathan will continue to advise large corporations across all phases of their capital life cycle as an investment banking associate with Morgan Stanley.

Prior to attending Booth, Craig Poeppelman worked for The Dow Chemical Company for 5 years. Most recently, he held the position of senior account manager in Chicago for Dow’s Epoxy division, responsible for leading global strategic account teams. Before this position, he held a variety of account manager roles covering multiple Dow business units and completed Dow’s Commercial Development Program in 2010. He is interned this past summer at Lubrizol Advanced Materials as part of the Marketing Leadership Development Program.

Meet the McGowan Fellow:

Born and raised in Hawaii, Jonathan Chun-Hung Fung is focusing on finance, accounting, and economics at Booth. Between his first and second years, he interned as a summer associate at Evercore, an independent investment bank in New York. On campus, he serves as a technical interview advisor for Booth’s Investment Banking Group and as a teaching assistant for a professor focused on financial information opacity issues for privately held firms. Jonathan graduated summa cum laude from the University of Hawaii at Manoa with a BBA in finance, accounting, and international business; and minors in Chinese and economics. Before graduate school, Jonathan worked as a public accountant with Deloitte & Touche’s Honolulu office, serving clients in the banking and hospitality industries. A certified public accountant and certified management accountant, he has passed all three levels of the chartered financial analyst exams. In the long run, he would like to return home to the islands and contribute to progress in the local economy.