Q1 What is the title of the finance student competition you may consider competing? Hint: You may Google search something like “student competitions in finance”.

The competition I found most intriguing is Shell Ideas360.

Q2 Describe the eligibility requirements, if any (e.g., undergraduate college student).

Requirements include full time undergraduate or postgraduate students who are 18 or older.

Q3 What are the competition criteria?

How original is the idea?

Is it easy to achieve?

What is the value?

What is the relevance?

Creative image of your idea.

Q4 What is the deadline for the submission?

There has not been a deadline posted yet for 2020 as it is updated every year. Previous years have fallen around January 19.

Q5 Why are you interested in this competition?

I am interested in this competition because it seems highly reputable, and regards important issues in the world. The main focus is to develop innovative ideas for the company.

Q6 What would be a possible project you may turn in for the competition? Describe it in at least 100 words.

For my project submission, I would develop a plan for the company to be more financially responsible when it comes to food, water, and energy resources. One of the biggest issues in the world today is the lack of these resources and it is important that major companies start making significant efforts to be responsible about this issue. For example, Shell is a major company that uses large amounts of water and energy. My project would be based around the finances of these resources, and how they can limit money spent while doing their part to be environmentally sustainable. I believe that Shell and any other company that is related would benefit a great deal from minimizing the expenses of these resources. Using RStudio, I could gather information on the companies stocks and financial data. After this, I would research environmental data and create intensity metrics to show how much the finances are truly effected by these resources. Rstudio would allow me to provide graphs as part of the “image” criteria.

Q7 List things that you learned in financial modeling course that could be helpful for your project in Q6. Describe it in at least 100 words.

As stated in my previous response, the use of stocks and financial graphing from the financial modeling course will benefit me greatly. It will allow me to easily provide visuals of all past data for certain companies and paint a picture for the future. Consolidating the financial data in one place is a great way to show where a company has fallen historically, and you can use this to expose their weaknesses. This will show you exactly what they need to improve on in the future and how they can become a better company. RStudio would play a key role in this competition for me.

Q8 List things that you learned in other finance courses at PSU that could be helpful for your project in Q6. Describe it in at least 100 words.

One course that I took this semester as well was Business and the Environment. One of the reasons why this competition stood out to me so much is because it mentioned the food, water, and energy resources. This intrigued me as it is a perfect connection between financial modeling “Finances”, and Business and the Environment “Environmental”. This is an extremely important connection in the world today and I am thankful that I was able to take both of these classes at the same time because they truly go hand in hand. To be a responsible company, it is important that you are able to succeed financially and sustainably.

Q9 Check the finance blog below and see if you see any post that may be helpful for your project in Q6. Discuss how it can be helpful in at least 100 words. Hint: The author of the blog writes articles on financial analysis using R. https://rviews.rstudio.com/categories/reproducible-finance-with-r/

This author has a few posts in the blog pertaining to pricing models and asset returns. These could help me in my project as they may show me some charts that I could include. Any charts that I am not aware of may help me to enhance my work and how in depth it is. If there are financial tests and graphs that he included in the posts, I could use them to research a company and find even more data than they provided. The key in this research is to uncover the data that people do not typically see or find. This way ypou are able to get an accurate conclusion of the company.

Q10 List things that you think could be helpful but not taught/offered at PSU finance courses. Discuss how it can be helpful in at least 100 words.

After the classes I have taken this semester, I think a class about international business sustainability would be highly beneficial. There are classes about international business, but I do not believe that there are enough classes that talk about sustainability in business and finance around the world. We know that these issues are worldwide, but more courses regarding how to research the differences of sustainability around the world and how finances effect them would be significant. Not only is it a hard concept to learn, it is also a great connection between finances and sustainability, but it also connects business and the world on another level. This would be great for the cluster model as well.