University of Southern Maine

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USM’s L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Colloquium to Look at Uncontested Board Elections

February 2, 2007

Brian P. Miller, a doctoral candidate at The Pennsylvania State University, will speak on “Corporate Governance: Are Uncontested Director Elections Meaningful?” at 4:45 p.m., Monday, February 12, in the University Room for Special Events in USM’s Glickman Family Library, Forest Ave., Portland. Miller’s lecture, the first of three lectures in the 2007 spring colloquium, is free and open to the public, but reservations are requested.  Please call 780-4022 to register, or see http://www.usm.maine.edu/~gramlich/colloquium/ to register online and learn about the upcoming lectures.  This event is organized by the L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Endowed Chair in Accounting in the USM School of Business and sponsored by L.L. Bean, Inc. with additional support provided by Swardlick Marketing Group.

Miller will discuss what uncontested director elections demonstrate in the corporate world. While directors are almost surely elected if uncontested, vote approval is associated with prior-year return on assets, and can affect management turnovers. Miller’s research focuses on the interplay between corporate governance, accounting disclosure and firm performance. He has collaborated with L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Professor of Accounting Jeffery Gramlich on a paper investigating the role of routine director elections in CEO monitoring.

The L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Chair in Accounting was established in memory of L.L. Bean Chief Financial Officer Lee Surace, who was a 1973 and 1981 USM graduate and head of the USM School of Business Advisory Council. The chair was made possible by a $1 million gift from L.L Bean and from its board chair, Leon Gorman and his wife Lisa Gorman, Jim and Maureen Gorman, and Tom Gorman. Jeffrey Gramlich, a leader in the fields of accounting and financial statement analysis, was appointed in 2003 as the first occupant of the L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Chair in Accounting in the USM School of Business.

The USM School of Business is the only business school in southern Maine accredited by AACSB International. Business schools worldwide seek professional accreditation by AACSB International, but only one third of all institutions have achieved it.

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