Mercer University President William D. Underwood today announced the appointment of David Shields, Ph.D., CPA, dean of the Haworth College of Business and professor of accounting at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, as dean of Mercer’s Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics, effective July 1.
“Dr. Shields is an experienced, energetic, visionary dean who has served in a wide variety of business leadership capacities. His understanding of business education and its opportunities at Mercer closely fit the University’s mission and the 10-Year Plan,” said Provost Wallace L. Daniel. “At all the schools he has served and especially at Western Michigan, Dr. Shields has led by consensus, and he is skilled at building innovative programs, at fundraising, and at reaching out to the community. Dr. Shields will provide strong, creative leadership to one of Mercer’s key academic units, and I am looking forward to working with him.
“I want to thank faculty members who served on the search committee, chaired by Dr. Walt Austin of the Stetson School of Business. I also want to express gratitude to Interim Dean William S. Mounts and to faculty in the Stetson School during this time of transition,” Dr. Daniel said.
An award-winning teacher and active scholar, Dr. Shields prior to being named dean at Western Michigan in 2006 served as associate dean for graduate and professional programs at the University of Houston. He also has served as associate dean and MBA director at Louisiana State University and professor of accounting at Thunderbird, the American Graduate School of International Management. Dr. Shields has served on the accounting faculties at the University of Houston, Texas A&M University, the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Administration at Rice University, the University of Michigan and the University of Florida. He began his career as a staff accountant for Coopers & Lybrand.
Dr. Shields earned his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. He received an MBA and a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from The Ohio State University.
“I am extremely honored to have been selected as the next dean of the Stetson School of Business and Economics at Mercer University. Mercer is an outstanding institution with great history and tradition. Its leadership is superb. I look forward to contributing to the continued enhancement of the University and of the Stetson School in Macon, Atlanta, Savannah and elsewhere,” Dr. Shields said. “I am attracted to Mercer because it is dedicated to providing students with unequaled opportunities for personal and professional growth, and to serving the greater community.”
Dr. Shields has a successful track record in fund-raising, having secured more than $6 million in gifts and pledges to Western Michigan over the past two years, as well as more than $600,000 in government grants. Western Michigan’s Haworth College of Business enrolls more than 4,500 undergraduate students and 400 graduate students, and has an operating budget of $18 million.
He also has experience establishing new academic programs at the institutions where he has served, including the Center for Sustainable Business, the Global Business Center and the Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Western Michigan, and the Global Energy MBA, a Texas Medical Center MBA and the Entrepreneurship Program at the University of Houston. At LSU he doubled the full-time MBA enrollment while increasing credentials of entering students.
A strong believer in corporate partnerships, Dr. Shields actively engaged the business community in advisory capacities at his current and previous institutions. He also has served as a consultant to more than 25 companies during his academic career.
Dr. Shields is active in AACSB — The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business — from which the Stetson School of Business and Economics holds accreditation. He has served on several AACSB accreditation visitation teams.
He has written numerous articles for academic journals and has engaged in externally funded research, primarily in the area of environmental accounting. Dr. Shields has served on the editorial boards of Accounting Horizons, the Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, the Journal of Cost and Managerial Decision Making, Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory, and Advances in Accounting. He has been an ad hoc reviewer for The Accounting Review and The Southern Economic Journal.
He was a finalist for the Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize at Rice, received Teacher of the Year honors at the University of Florida, and was recipient of the Halliburton Faculty Teaching Award and was named Melcher Faculty Teaching Fellow at the University of Houston. Dr. Shields also received the MidCon Corporation Award for Teaching Excellence (Executive MBA) at the University of Houston.
About the Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics at Mercer:
Established in 1984, the Eugene W. Stetson School of Business and Economics offers bachelor’s, MBA, Professional MBA, Executive MBA and Master of Accountancy degrees. The School holds accreditation from the prestigious AACSB International — The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, considered the hallmark of excellence among the nation’s top business schools and placing it among the top 25 percent of all business schools in the world. For 2009, the Princeton Review recognized the School as No. 3 for “Greatest Opportunity for Women” and one of its “Best 296 Business Schools.”
About Mercer University:
Founded in 1833, Mercer University is a dynamic and comprehensive center of undergraduate, graduate and professional education. The University has approximately 7,600 students; 11 schools and colleges – liberal arts, law, pharmacy, medicine, business, engineering, education, theology, music, nursing and continuing and professional studies; major campuses in Macon, Atlanta and Savannah; three regional academic centers across the state; a university press; two teaching hospitals — Memorial University Medical Center and the Medical Center of Central Georgia; educational partnerships with Warner Robins Air Logistics Center in Warner Robins and Piedmont Healthcare in Atlanta; an engineering research center in Warner Robins; a performing arts center in Macon; and a NCAA Division I athletic program. For more information, visit www.mercer.edu.
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