Jack S. Nyman, Director
The Steven L. Newman Real Estate Institute
Baruch College, CUNY

Two Key Positions Filled at Newman Real Estate Institute

New York, NY – April 30, 2009

Two key staff positions at the Steven L. Newman Real Estate Institute have been filled, announced Jack S. Nyman, Director of the Institute. Elizabeth Obih-Frank has assumed the position of Associate Director, Real Estate Education Programs. Emily Grace has assumed the position of Associate Director, Research & Grants.
Both positions are conceived of as strategic business units within the Institute, Nyman explained. Responsibilities for education programs include growing enrollment, enriching curricula, expanding the provision of custom onsite training workshops, introducing online courses, and maintaining the high caliber of the Institute’s roster of instructors.

Responsibilities for research & grants include maintaining a research agenda responsive to evolving industry needs, producing top-drawer research products, and raising funds to underwrite research projects, as well as events such as the Institute’s Sustainability Shoptalk series and other initiatives. The research agenda will be shaped by the Institute’s Advisory Research Council, now in formation.

“Both Elizabeth and Emily are exceptionally versatile and capable individuals,” Nyman observed, “and the strengths they bring to the Institute individually – as well as the synergies they’re sure to generate as members of our team – promise to deliver substantial benefits that will shape the Institute’s work for years to come.

Obih-Frank is a veteran of the real estate industry, academia, and corporate training programs. Most recently with Sotheby's International Realty, she served as a Sales Training Manager, working throughout the United States. She acquired New York State Licensed Broker experience with The Marketing Directors and Houlihan Lawrence. In previous positions she introduced diversity-training programs and conflict resolution skills to school administrators, teachers, and students throughout the greater New York area.

“In joining our Institute, Elizabeth is ‘coming home’ in a very real sense,” Nyman reflected: for 14 years she was an Adjunct Lecturer at CUNY’s Queens, Lehman, and Hunter Colleges. She developed new curricula on Women in Development & Politics and Contemporary Women’s Literature, lectured, led group discussions, created and supervised team research projects, and advised students.
   
Obih-Frank holds an advanced master’s degree in international educational development, and a master’s degree in education and politics from Teachers College, Columbia University. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia. As someone who grew up on three continents, travels widely, and views herself as “an internationalist,” Obih-Frank delights in Baruch’s renowned diversity.

Grace brings the Institute broad expertise in fundraising, branding, marketing, publicity, finance, project management, and research. She’s also a veteran writer, and a professional engineer, registered in California. She joins the Institute from The Bank of New York Mellon, where she helped the Technology Services Group more efficiently process Requests for Proposals (RFPs). She also contributed to the bank’s Global Integration Project and Service Definitions Project. For the Institutional Investments Department of AllianceBernstein she wrote RFPs and due diligence reports.

As Development Officer for Stevens Institute of Technology, she wrote RFPs and successful grant applications, and she developed a partnership resulting in generous endowments and advantageous alliances. As a member of the Major Gifts Team, she helped Stevens’s major donor society grow its membership and strengthen its external relationships. As Director of Corporate, Foundation, and Faculty Initiatives, she helped the Institute surpass its five-year capital campaign goal.

In research roles for Stevens, she conducted a benchmarking investigation, helped develop a course designed to inspire budding student entrepreneurs to launch new ventures, and worked with a team of professors and the PhD Program Director to investigate the entrepreneurship process at its earliest stages. With faculty and the Associate Provost, she helped plan an interdisciplinary effort that resulted in a $570,000 National Science Foundation grant for the newly created Stevens Environmental Entrepreneurship (E2) Program.
 
Grace earned a MS from Stevens Institute of Technology, an MBA in Finance from Auburn University, and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Clemson University. She is now pursuing a PhD in Technology Management from Stevens; for her thesis she is developing a predictive model for RFP success.