Senior Business Majors Placed in Top 100 in International Competition

Westminster College seniors Joshua Masters and Nathan Silvis ranked 74th out of 3,726 teams worldwide by achieving a 33.2% return on equity in The Business Strategy Game for the week ending Feb. 19.

Working together as "The Classic Shoe Company," they are students in a class taught by Dr. Jacque King, Westminster assistant professor of business.  In addition to Masters and Silvis, nine other teams in two of King's classes are entered in the semester-long competition.

"This is the first team to rank since the fall 2010 semester," King said.  "I am excited about what is ahead for all of them."

Masters, an accounting and business administration major, and Silvis, a business administration major, outperformed teams from schools that included the University of Alabama, Stetson University, the University of Nebraska, the University of Hawaii, and City University of Hong Kong, all formidable opponents according to King.

This semester's competition involves nearly 4,000 teams from 239 colleges and universities around the world.  Each week, the best-performing teams are measured on four performance variables: overall score (current year), earnings per share, return on average equity, and stock price.

The Business Strategy Game is an online exercise where class members are divided into teams and assigned the task of running an athletic footwear company in competition against companies managed by other class members.  Company operations parallel those of actual athletic footwear companies who compete in a global market, selling athletic footwear in four geographic regions-Europe-Africa, North America, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America.

All aspects of The Business Strategy Game parallel the functioning of the real-world athletic footwear market, allowing students to think rationally and logically in making decisions and receive valuable practice in making a variety of business decisions under circumstances that mirror real-world competitive conditions.  Click here for more information.

Contact King at (724) 946-7163 or email for additional information about Westminster's participation.