Seventeen Westminster College students who are members of the Blue Blazer Investment Committee spent four days exploring the business and finance world of New York City March 26-30. They were given special “insider access” to some of Wall Street’s most revered financial institutions. 
Originally started in 1996, the Blue Blazers is a financial committee that has received state and national media attention. This was their fourth trip to New York since the organization’s inception.
Every year the Westminster Board of Trustees allocates college endowment funds to the Blazers to invest in the stock market. The students do extensive research and then buy and sell stock to build and manage an actual investment portfolio. Through this experience, they receive the rare opportunity to experience how investing in the stock market works firsthand.
Blazers are required to report to the Board of Trustees and inform them about developments in the group and the portfolio.
This year the Blazers portfolio of securities is valued at nearly $400,000.
The recent New York trip was planned and coordinated by Brock Ayers, the founder of the Blue Blazers and Financial Advisor and First Vice President of Wachovia Securities, LLC in St. Louis and member of the Westminster College Board of Trustees.
“The Blue Blazers are truly living the mission of Westminster, gaining real world experience with New York City as their classroom,” says Dr. Barney Forsythe, President of the College, who accompanied the group. “Domestic and international students with a wide range of majors and interests joined faculty, staff, alumni, and even a trustee learning about the whole range of business and finance at its highest level.”
First stop for the group was The Museum of American Financial History in the Historic Bank of New York Building where they received an excellent overview of some of the markets from an historical perspective through the many interesting displays.
Next they toured the New York Stock Exchange, learning about the integration of electronic trading from the floor specialists and observing the floor in action.
“Since 9/11, it is amazing for any group to have this kind of access to the floor,” says Darius Dashtaki, President of the Blazers. “Yet we were able to see traders hustle from trading station to trading station with their digital PC’s at their sides, making market orders.”
At the Allianz/PIMCO Global Sales office, the group received an insider view of a mutual fund support organization and how they support clients and financial representatives in the field. The visit was hosted by Janet Canela-Flores.
The Blazers also met with James Gentile, an equity analyst with the Newark Capital Hedge Fund, who gave one of the best presentations on evaluating stocks that any Blazer group had ever experienced.
A tour of Bloomberg’s, the famous financial news/reporting corporation, was a high point of the New York visit. Bloomberg’s has been called the Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory for the world of investment news and information.
At the New York Mercantile Exchange, the group received a tour, witnessed commodities being traded and the final bell. Once trading was over, the students were allowed on the floor to learn how to trade crude oil and then led through a simulated trading session.
Every stop included career advice and counseling.
The Blazers also dined at Carmines restaurant as the guests of Frank Turner, Westminster class of 1984 and Senior Vice President of Lehman Brothers, and at The Princeton Club as the guests of Tom Mangan, Westminster class of 1991 and President of Employee Benefits and Pensions for HUB International in New York, and Greg Richard, Westminster class of 1988 and Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Synark, Inc. in New York.
Other Westminster personnel besides President Forsythe and Ayers accompanying the group were Blazer faculty advisors Ed Mirielli, Associate Professor of Computer Science, and Linda Webster, Interim Associate Dean of Faculty and Associate Professor of Computer Science.
“This is a very intense and dynamic planning process and trip,” Ayers says. “Students gain exposure to elements of our financial system that many professionals do not experience in person. The trip has had a major impact on those who have participated and on the performance of the group.”