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The purpose of this paper is to document and compare the characteristics of two student-managed investment funds at the University.

This study uses a case study approach to achieve this purpose.

Consistent with other studies, this study finds considerable differences in funding, oversight and the structure of the courses in which the students manage the portfolios. This is the case even though the portfolios are managed by students in courses offered by the same department at the same university.

This study presents different possible ways of obtaining funds and structuring courses in which the students manage investment portfolios.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the embedded challenges of student-managed investment funds (SMIFs) and provide recommendations to work with these issues.

The paper analyzes and critiques the ways SMIFs are structured and operated and makes several suggestions.

The paper details seven unique challenges of SMIFs compared to professionally managed investment funds. The source of these challenges is that SMIFs are set up for educational purposes, which makes the operation and management different from performance-focused investment funds. The paper proposes several recommendations on how to align the educational focus with fund performance.

The paper is original and based on primary research.

Student Managed Funds (SMFs) are extremely popular investment programs at many colleges and universities that provide their students with experiential learning opportunities to manage real money. However, the size, scope and specific features of these SMFs differ substantially. The purpose of this paper is to deliberate about a panel discussion on several important SMF issues that took place at the Southern Finance Association conference in November, 2016.

The panel includes one moderator and four panelists, all of whom serve as SMF faculty directors at their respective schools.

The panelists’ answers show that almost no two SMFs are created the same, supervised the same way by different faculty directors or managed the same way by their respective students.

The panelists provide insight about their respective SMFs and offer advice on how to create SMFs and how to supervise students managing SMFs in a more effective manner.

This paper aims to explore how the student fund managers perceive the benefits of being part of the fund. Furthermore, this paper examines the country-specific challenges of setting up and managing a student-managed investment fund (SMIF) in India.

Qualitative content analysis technique is used to identify, compare and retrieve critical themes about the present state of SMIF clubs in India. The data collection method involved structured, in-depth online interviews with ten student fund managers from various higher educational institutions in India.

Some of the study’s key findings indicate that the existence of SMIFs as part of learning facilitates group decision-making and peer learning. Additionally, this study brings to light specific issues related to registration, incorporating real-world practices and integrating SMIF into the academic curriculum.

The outcomes of this study shall be of use to students and the teaching fraternity across Indian colleges and universities who aspire to set up SMIFs as part of experiential learning. This study will also help existing SMIF clubs in India understand how their counterparts work and can consequently improvise their organizational structure and functioning.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first interview-based evaluation of the present structure of SMIFs structured as clubs in India.

The purpose of this paper is to present a review of the student managed investment fund at the School of Business, University of Connecticut.

The authors trace the history and growth of the fund and identify the special features and dimensions that have contributed to its success.

The operation of the fund is a constantly evolving program and the authors discuss the important changes and improvements made in the program since its inception in the early 2000s in response to growth in the number of finance majors, new career opportunities in the field of investments and most importantly, the strength of capital markets and the development of new instruments in the capital markets. The authors also discuss the common features of over 300 student funds in the USA. The authors close with a discussion of the limitations and constraints the fund advisors at, and possibly, at other schools, face in the management and administration of the fund, and also what developments and adjustments the authors expect to see in these funds in the future.

The authors combine extensive analyses of fund history and performance. The authors also provide some suggestions for the future direction and priorities for student funds.

In 2004, Roanoke College began offering a Student-Managed Fund course, wherein students were able to manage a portfolio of equity and fixed income using real money. While not a widely adopted concept at the time, it has since become quite common in finance programs, either through courses or clubs. In February 2019, the author supplemented activities in the course with the addition of real cryptoassets for students to manage. The paper discusses the design, implementation, and pedagogical advantages of the fund.

The paper expands on the existing literature regarding student-managed investment funds (SMIFs or SMFs) by presenting a case study on the implementation of a student-managed cryptoasset fund at Roanoke College.

The value of experiential learning through student-managed funds (SMFs) is well established. Thus, these programs have become much more common in recent years and are now often expanding to securities beyond equities and bonds. The introduction of cryptoassets to be traded by students at Roanoke College is another step in improving students' exposure to various markets and appears to further improve research and critical thinking skills.

This is certainly one of the first, and to the author's knowledge may be the only, real money cryptoasset fund managed by students.

The James Fund at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School of Management is a small, recently established, course-driven student-managed investment fund (SMIF). The purpose of this paper is to provide insight to new and existing funds in improving individual fund operation and structure.

The James Fund seeks to outperform an 80/20 equity/fixed income benchmark by investing exclusively in exchange traded funds and to move primary emphasis away from idiosyncratic risk and individual equity valuation back toward asset allocation, the most significant driver of portfolio performance. Buy and sell decisions must receive a three-fifths majority in voting among students and adhere with the investment policy statement.

Groupthink, a common problem in student-managed funds, is observed in trade proposal and manager voting patterns.

Groupthink is partially addressed through the use of instructor feedback on individual student trade diaries. Student managers transition each semester; therefore, the portfolio must meet dormant period criteria limited to a specific list of broadly diversified ETFs, mitigating potential problems from knowledge transfer between management teams that are largely unexamined in the context of SMIFs.

The purpose of this paper is to trace the evolution of the Archway Investment Fund (AIF) at Bryant University from its founding in 2005 as a portfolio focused exclusively on US equities to a multi-asset program that incorporates US equities, non-US equities, equity ETFs, REITs, individual bonds, fixed income ETFs and options. It also describes the explicit introduction of environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations into the investment process.

The paper follows a case study approach.

The paper describes the programmatic changes that accompanied this evolution in these areas: finance department curriculum innovations; the investment guidelines and constraints that govern the AIF; the investment process utilized; the oversight and governance process; and the reporting, presentation, and publicity initiatives that keep critical constituencies (university administration, faculty, alumni and students) informed and engaged in this program to sustain its success.

The vast majority of student-managed funds are equity funds focused on individual stock selection. The AIF is a multi-asset fund with separate equity and fixed income sub-portfolios that explicitly incorporates ESG factors into the security selection process.

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) provided funds to 25 universities in its service region for the establishment of student-managed investment funds (SMIF). The purpose of this paper is to examine the TVA Investment Challenge Program and its implementation at The University of Tennessee at Martin (UTM).

Each university has the freedom to structure the process for students to manage its investment fund as it chooses. This paper provides a description of the overall Investment Challenge Program and the specific Program at UTM.

The Investment Challenge Program is a valuable experiential learning opportunity for finance majors at UTM. Participating students enhance their portfolio management knowledge, their written and oral communication skills, and their employment opportunities.

The paper is limited to TVA Portfolio guidelines and managerial style.

Faculty who supervise similar programs at other universities may be able to replicate some aspects of the program’s design.

The paper describes the TVA Investment Challenge, a unique program of SMIF. TVA provided funds to 25 universities with the stipulation that the student managers adhere to the same guidelines as TVA’s professional money managers. The university is a participant in the Program.

Student-managed investment funds typically pursue “plain vanilla” objectives. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the value of adding option strategies to reduce the risk of equity positions around earnings announcements. The collar strategy is one such technique with the advantages of a low net cost and limited potential losses.

The authors provide recommendations for utilizing the collar strategy around earnings announcements. The authors also discuss how the value of this strategy is related to the literature on option pricing and earnings announcement returns.

Risk management strategies can enhance the pedagogical value of student-managed investment funds. The authors document how students have successfully utilized the collar strategy to immunize risk.

The collar strategy can enhance the pedagogical value of student-managed investment classes in several ways. First, students learn how to implement risk reduction strategies. Second, the proper implementation of these strategies requires students to learn the complex mechanisms associated with corporate earnings dissemination and analyst coverage. This also provides an opportunity to study earnings drift, which is a persistent and economically significant financial anomaly.