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The Iona College team placed third overall in the Fed Challenge at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which was held on Friday, November 23. This was only the third year that Iona had a team in the event, which is a competition for undergraduates in the Second Federal Reserve District (all of New York State, the 12 northernmost counties in New Jersey, and Fairfield County, Connecticut).

Under the direction of Dr. Mary Lesser, Professor of Economics in the School of Arts and Sciences, the Iona team consists of five presenters and a group of other students who worked on research and helped to develop the overall presentation. This year’s presenters are Tim Clark (class of ’08, Economics); Susom Ghosh (class of ’10, Economics); Daniel Arce (class of ’08, International Business); Kristy Mealia (class of ’08, Economics) and Ava Sun (class of ’08, International Business with an Economics minor).

The team competed against West Point and The College of New Jersey in the morning round, which entailed giving a 20-minute presentation assessing the current state of the economy and recommending a specific course for monetary policy, and a 15-minute question-and-answer session from a panel of three judges. Iona was one of two teams that scored highly enough to advance to the final four.

Competing again in the afternoon (giving the same presentation but addressing more challenging questions from a different panel of judges) the Iona College team placed third overall, coming in behind SUNY Genseo and Rutgers Newark, both of which have placed first in past competitions. Iona was therefore the only private college in the final four (and the only team with women presenters).

As third place winners the team will bring home an eagle head trophy as well as awards from the Moody’s Foundation in the amounts of $2,500 to the team and $5,000 to the department.

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For questions or more information please contact:
Dawn Insanalli
Public Relations Office
Iona College, 715 North Avenue, New Rochelle, N.Y. 10801
tel: (914) 633-2005 fax: (914) 637-2711
dinsanalli@iona.edu

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