Ask Dr. Marilyn Okleshen the best thing about her job, and she’ll answer without hesitation: watching leaders emerge. Since 1993, the longtime MSU accounting professor has served as faculty advisor to the local chapter of Delta Sigma Pi, a coed business fraternity that allows students to connect with the business world through guest lectures and corporate visits. In 2004 and 2005, Okleshen was named Delta Sigma Pi’s National Chapter Advisor of the Year. "Sometimes students come in quiet and hesitant," she says. "Then they blossom and take off. When they leave, I know they’re going to be outstanding professionals."
Students form the focus of Dr. Okleshen»s work in the classroom and beyond. As a teacher, she strives to give them all the skills they’ll need in the professional world. Outside of class, she gets to know her students and helps them grow into the sort of people who have an edge in the marketplace and find success in their field.
Okleshen knows what it’s like to be a business student at Minnesota State Mankato. She earned a bachelor’s degree and MBA in the College of Business, and first taught here in the 1980s. After earning her doctorate at the University of Nebraska, where she studied business administration with an accounting specialization, she returned to Mankato in 1990. She’s now a professor in the Department of Accounting and Business Law.
As a faculty member, she’s played an important role in the evolution of the College of Business. Recently the College has pursued several key initiatives to better serve students and prepare them for a changing world. Okleshen says the positive results of those efforts are unmistakable.
For example, Okleshen helped to make up the quality faculty needed for the College of Business to gain accreditation from AACSB International (The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) in the 1990s. Ever since, she’s watched growing numbers of corporate recruiters flock to MSU’s campus. "Now we have more demand for our students than we have supply," she says. "That can only be good for students."
Nearest to Okleshen’s heart is her work as faculty advisor to MSU’s chapter of Delta Sigma Pi. The coed business fraternity allows students to build lifelong friendships, serve the local community, and make important connections with people in the corporate world and with members of other chapters around the country. "It’s the best part of my job," she says. "It is so much fun to get to know your students, to watch them grow and expand their personal professional skills. I get to watch leaders emerge."
